Contemporary (1950 CE - Present)
Short Teaching Module: Czech Independence Day Speech
The dramatic changes in Eastern Europe happened so rapidly and over so broad an area that making these events understandable for students can be a challenge. This teaching module uses a landmark speech by Vaclav Havel as a means to unpack the rapid events of 1989.
Miscellaneous Jokes: GDR Jokes C
George Orwell once wrote, "Every joke is a tiny revolution." In state-socialist societies that had (or have) totalitarian characteristics, individuals found clever ways to carve out areas of freedom for themselves.
Excerpt from Anatoly Chernyaev's Diary
This personal account offers insight into the private sentiments of Anatoly Chernyaev, Mikhail Gorbachev's top foreign policy adviser in the 1980s.
Report on a Working Visit of Wojciech Jaruzelski to Moscow
Following the historic roundtable talks that took place in Poland from February to April 1989 between Communist and opposition leaders, Polish Communist leader Wojciech Jaruzelski met with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in Moscow to discuss the unfolding events in Poland and Polish-Soviet relati
Short Teaching Module: Remembering Tiananmen Square
Although China is located quite far from Eastern Europe, dissidents in Eastern Europe identified with the struggles by opposition leaders in China and used images of the 1989 Tiananmen Square uprising to reinforce memories of resistance in Eastern Europe.
Southeast Asian Politics: Website, Sisters In Islam
The women’s movement has always been inherently global, but by the end of the 20th century there was a new burst of transnational women’s organizing as women used new technologies to network at home and abroad.
Southeast Asian Politics: Song, Philippine Feminist Movement
This song, entitled Maria and sung in Tagalog (a Philippine language), challenges cultural constructions of women as passive, as sex objects or domestic cooks. “Maria” is used as a generic term for woman. The song identifies heroines such as Lorena Barros, Gabriela Silang, and Tandang Sora.
Short Teaching Module: Chinese Propaganda Posters
Visual images provide valuable material for the exploration of childhood, youth and history.
Dona Marina, Cortes’ Translator: Painting, Santa Barraza
A representation of Malinche painted by a renowned Chicana visual artist and teacher from Texas. It depicts the beautiful, life-giving Malintzin, is a tiny image, crafted on metal, and meant to evoke ex-voto and other devotional images from Mexico.
Soviet Dissidents and the "Brain Drain"
In the beginning of 1989, Henry Kissinger met with Mikhail Gorbachev for an informal conversation about the future of U.S.-Soviet cooperation, particularly concerning economic opportunities in the Soviet Union. The problem for U.S.-Soviet trade was the Jackson-Vanik Amendment to the 1974 U.S.