FASS2100: Ideas and Movements that Changed the

Pablo Picasso, Guernica (1937)

World Lecture 1, 2023
Professor Brendon O’Connor
 Lifelong learning
• Fat White Family “Whitest Boy on the Beach”
• Militarism and Nazism – why?
• Curiosity, students as teachers,
• Trump as downstream from US culture
• Alt-right and humour
• Right wing Antisemitism vs “Progressive” uses of Nazi iconography
• 1. Not blank sheets of paper and Wallace on learning as about the choice what
to think about
• 2. Multiple disciplinary learning: Trump and Nihilism
• 3. Learning is one of life’s joys and it is a lifelong process if you want it to be.
What job you get is far from guaranteed but learning and reading books is
something in your hands!
Ethos of
FASS2100
Lecture Schedule:
Module 1: Ideologies
1.August 2: Nationalism and Orwell
Reading: George Orwell, Essays
2. August 9: Radicalism and Kushner
Reading: Rachel Kushner, The Hard Crowd
3. August 16: Totalitarianism, Anti-Semitism and Arendt
Reading: Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism
Module 2: Feminism: Gender, Sex and Power
4.August 23: Feminism and Butler
Reading: Gender Trouble
5.August 30: Slavery and Black Feminism
Reading: Toni Morrison, Beloved
Module 3: Narcissism, Technology and Post-Humanism
6.September 6: Narcissism and Lasch
Reading: Christopher Lasch, The Culture of Narcissism
7.September 13: Narcissism and Wallace
Reading: David Foster Wallace, “Good old neon”: CONTENT WARNING: SUICIDE IS DISCUSSED IN THIS
READING BY WALLACE
8.September 20: AI and Winterson
Reading: Jeanette Winterson, 12 Bytes
Module 4: Colonialism and Racism
9.October 4: First nations peoples and Birch
Reading: Tony Birch, The White Girl.
10.October 11: Racism, Colonialism and McCarthy
Reading: Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian
CONTENT WARNING: THIS BOOK IS EXTREMELY VIOLENT, AS WAS THE
COLONISATION OF THE AMERICAS
Module 5: Maoism, Taoism and Xiism.
11.October 18: Maoism, Taoism and Ah Cheng
Reading Ah Cheng, The King of Trees (3 Novellas)
12.October 25: Chinese Politics
The Roast
13.November 1: The Tutors Take-over Lecture
Administration
THE RECORDED LECTURES AND ALL THE
CONTENT CAN BE FOUND UNDER:
“MODULES” ON THE FASS2100 CANVAS
SITE
FOR ALL BASIC ADMINISTRATION
QUESTIONS PLEASE CONTACT THE HEAD
TUTOR: DR DAN DIXON
<DANIEL.DIXON@SYDNEY.EDU.AU>
SUCH AS: ABOUT CHANGING TUTORIALS
ABOUT ASSIGNMENT EXPECTATIONS
ABOUT SIMPLE EXTENSIONS
Reflection Pieces:
You need to write two 750-word papers on two of the below set texts. These pieces of writing will be your
thoughts and reflections on a particular text. There is no need to use reviews or write about the views of experts
on these texts. What is wanted is your understanding and appreciation (or dislike) of the text. The reflection piece
can be a book review essay. Or the reflection assignment can be a piece of creative writing: a short-story, poem
with exegesis, a song, a play, an imagined interview. I will post examples of both approaches. The creative
approach is merely an option and is certainly not expected. A thoughtful book or film review is just as good as a
well-crafted creative piece.
Each response paper will be worth 20% of your total grade
These are the texts you can write on:
George Orwell, Essays
Rachel Kushner, The Hard Crowd
Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism
Judith Butler, Gender Trouble
Toni Morrison, Beloved
Christopher Lasch, The Culture of Narcissism
David Foster Wallace, “Good Old Neon”
Jennette Winterson, 12 Bytes
Tony Birch, The White Girl
Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian
Ah Cheng, The King of Trees: Three Novellas
Assessment: Essay: 50% of your mark
• This is an essay of 2500 words in length (not counting references and footnotes) on any of
the below set texts. You cannot write on the texts or topics chosen for your response pieces.
For example, you cannot write a reflection piece on Judith Butler, then an essay on this
scholar; or a reflection piece on Good Old Neon and then an essay on The Culture of
Narcissism. The aim of this rule is to encourage students to read a broad range of texts for
this unit. The essay should be a more wide-ranging piece of writing than the reflection
papers, it should draw on your close reading of the text as well as reviews and expert
opinions. The text should be placed in context and you should discuss one or more of the
debates the text contributes to. Below are the texts you can write an essay about. These set
texts should be the focus of your essay (ie approximately 60% of the essay should relate
directly to one of these set texts). George Orwell, Essays, Rachel Kushner, The Hard Crowd,
Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism; Judith Butler, Gender Trouble, Toni
Morrison, Beloved; Christopher Lasch, The Culture of Narcissism, Jennette Winterson, 12
Bytes, Tony Birch, The White Girl, Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian, Ah Cheng, The King of
Trees: Three Novellas
Students have written on Beloved and Kendrick Lamar; Lasch and BoJack Horsemen; Ah Cheng
and the film YiYi; and Butler and Female Grunge Music.
•FINAL ESSAY
•You can write your own essay question/topic or answer one of the questions below.
1.Why are Orwell’s Essays such an iconic collection of writings? Is the reputation of these essays deserved?
2.Rachel Kushner could be described as a political and artistic radical. What might this mean? And what makes something or
someone radical?
3.Discuss how Simone de Beauvoir and Toril Moi address this quote: “one is not born, but rather becomes, woman.”
4.“Elizabeth Kolbert’s The Sixth Extinction is a call to action. In politics the key question is “what is to be done?” In the case of
the global environment, what needs to be done?” Discuss
5.Tony Birch said in a recent interview that in “Australia we have an inability to see ourselves as we really are” and the aim
of The White Girl was “to open up a more honest discussion of who we are.” Discuss how Birch attempts to do this with his
novel.
6.Discuss how the characters in Beloved represent African American experiences with trauma and the legacy of slavery.
7.“Christopher Lasch’s 1979 book The Culture of Narcissism is prescient with regard to how people often use social media.”
Discuss
8.“Ah Cheng’s three novellas in The King of Trees provide valuable insights into the impact of Taoism and Maoism on Chinese
society.” Discuss
•Alternatively, you can design your own question or topic heading to write about. An example of a question you could
design could be: “Are The King of Trees novellas effective works of political dissent?” or you can discuss a title heading such as
“Orwell, Colonialism and Post-Colonialism” or “Violence and Agency: Morrison’s Beloved and Rankin’s Citizen” or “What David
Foster Wallace takes from The Culture of Narcissism” or “Feminist approaches to the body: de Beauvoir, Moi and Butler” or
“Beloved: Intergenerational Trauma and Community” or “Orwell and his Imitators: Christopher Hitchens, Robert Manne and Ali
Smith.” You can borrow one of these examples as your essay topic or make up your own topic. You should always discuss
the approach you plan to take with an essay with your tutor before writing your paper as your tutor will mark your
paper!
 Orwell and his admirers: Why is he iconic?

Christopher Hitchens on Orwell (6.45mins in): got 3 big

questions right anti-colonialist, anti-Fascist, anti-Stalinist

Andrew O’Hagan on Orwell

Robert Manne ABR

George Packer

Dorian Lynskey

Ali Smith Orwell Prize finalist

Orwell
• During the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) – 1938
a conflict that had Fascist, Socialist,
Stalinist and Anarchist factions. 1945
• A conflict where ideas and movements
were deadly
1949
• George Orwell was shaped by his
disappointments in this conflict which
most obviously are written about in
Homage to Catalonia.
Orwell and Ideas
• Orwell contest of ideas: Fascism, Communism, Capitalism
(supported none of these. A culturally conservative,
democratic socialist)
• Great enemies of his life Stalinism, left-wing intellectual
arrogance and lazy thinking, and bad writing.
• An independent literary man of the political left.
Stalinism = Why such a big deal for Orwell?

Socialism in one country

Collectivization

Forced industrialization
Great Terror
http://hawaii.edu/powerkills/NOTE4.HTM

Stalin thought
Comparisons with Mao
Totalitarianism
 “Notes on Nationalism”
Orwell’s definition of nationalism:
“By ‘nationalism’ I mean first of all the habit of assuming that human beings can be classified like insects
[speciesism and essentialism] and that whole blocks of millions or tens of millions of people can be confidently
labelled ‘good’ or ‘bad’”(1).
“But secondly — and this is much more important — I mean the habit of identifying oneself with a single nation
or other unit, placing it beyond good and evil and recognising no other duty than that of advancing its interests.
Nationalism is not to be confused with patriotism… By ‘patriotism’ I mean devotion to a particular place and a
particular way of life, which one believes to be the best in the world but has no wish to force on other people

ORWELL’S DEFINITION OF NATIONALISM IS UNUSAUL: relates to an attachment to a nation or a set of political

beliefs like Trotskyism
Competitive prestige: “Great” vs “Not so Great”
NOT REALLY A DEFINITION OF NATIONALISM – MORE A DEFINITION OF DOGMA or Blind Loyalty
“The nationalist not only does not
disapprove of atrocities committed
by his own side, but he has a
remarkable capacity for not even
hearing about them.”

From George Orwell’s “Notes on

Nationalism”
American funded wars of the 1980s

“The effects of the Central American war for the region were
dreadful. In Nicaragua it left 30,000 dead (as historian William
LeoGrande point out, relative to the population this was more than
the United States lost in the Civil War, the two world wars, and the
Korean and Vietnam wars combined). The country had over 100,000
refugees and an economy with inflation out of control and massive
unemployment. In tiny El Salvador the effects were even worse;
70,000 dead, death squads roaming he countryside, villages
destroyed, lives shattered.”(Westad, The Global Cold War, p347)
More
Standard
Theories of
Nationalism
 Lieven has two American nationalism.
1. Exceptional Nationalism: Civic Nationalism

In words of Herman Melville (1819-1891): “We Americans are the peculiar

chosen people- the Israel of our time; we bear the ark of the liberties of the
world. God has predestined, mankind expects, In the great things from our
race; and the great things we feel in our souls. The rest of the nations must
soon be in our rear. We are pioneers of the world; the advance guard, sent on
through the wilderness of untried things, to break a path into the New World
that is ours.” (p33)

2. Embittered Nationalism: Ethno-nationalism

Radical nationalism has many fathers, but its mother is defeat, and her milk is
called humiliation.

This capacity for chauvinist nationalism in the United States can be explained
largely by the fact that the role of defeat in the genesis of nationalism resides
not only in the defeat of nations as a whole, but of classes, groups and indeed
individuals within them. The hatred and fear directed abroad by nationalism
often emanates from hatreds and tensions at home
Negative sides of nationalism: “demon in the cellar”

Treat other nations and

their people as lesser,
Racism Power Maximization Militarism
rivals, threats, and
weird

Reductive framing of
Significant opposition Preference for
issues and conflicts:
to multilateralism, unilateralism or Lack of knowledge of
Manichean view of
internationalism and “coalitions of the the rest of the world
enemies and supposed
legalism willing”
threats

Lack of interest in, and

at times even a lack of
empathy for, the rest of
the world
Can you have good nationalism?
Very important if nationalism is
ever present

• Only nations can solve climate

change?
• Treat it as a security threat?
• The existence of liberal-
democracy and nations are stake
Politics and the English Language: Orwell’s rules

• Avoid PHRASES TACKED TOGETHER: PREFABRICATED HEN-HOUSE

• Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to
seeing in print.
• Never use a long word where a short one will do.
• If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
• Never use the passive where you can use the active.
• Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think
of an everyday English equivalent.
• Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.
• Me: “Brutal”, “I literally died”, or what of GIFs?
How to improve your writing?

• If you want to improve the quality and beauty of your writing (and who doesn’t!) you need to read great
stylists and think about how they do what they do so well.
• The magazine the New Yorker as well as the New York Review of Books and the London Review of Books are
places where great writing can be found on a weekly basis. Try to read these magazines regularly. Reading
book review magazines like the NYBooks.com and the LRB.co.uk will also expand your knowledge base
considerably across a wide range of topics. I highly recommend that you become familiar with some of these
reviewers Garry Wills (http://www.nybooks.com/contributors/wills-garry/), Alan Hollinghurst, Elizabeth
Drew, Jackson Lears, Geoff Dyer, Rachel Kushner, Laurie Penny, Andrew O’Hagan, Jenny Diski, and Joan
Didion. James Wood is often considered the best book reviewer in the world. Read some of his reviews at:
http://www.newyorker.com/contributors/james-wood
• NB: The key to success is reading widely and starting the planning, drafting and writing of the essay early
rather than at the last minute.
• Great advice on writing for the highly regarded author Jenny Diski:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/jun/20/jenny-diski-author-author
• "For me writing is the editing. It's where the you make the story your own. Draft, redraft, let the thing sit,
and then consider it again, read closely, carefully, cut away everything that you haven't properly thought
through, and some things that you have. …Good writing is hard to come by. It's what I understand Beckett to
have meant when he wrote, towards the end of his life, what any writer must take as essential instruction:
'Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better."