French History Seminar/Seminaire d'histoire de France

Pernicious Objects: The Small Things that Haunted Europe after WWII

February 16, 2024 | 4:00PM - 6:00PM
 | 
Online
Centre for the Study of France and the Francophone World, Centre for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (CERES), Europe & Eurasia

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This was an online event
Pernicious Objects: The Things that Haunted France after World War II
What happened to all the busts of Philippe Pétain after 1944? What happened to the millions of Vichy collaborationist and Nazi-related posters, busts, insignia, hats, guns, arm bands, calendars, pamphlets, and children’s books that France was awash in by the mid-1940s? Scholarship on contemporary dilemmas posed by WWII-era material culture, including the thriving trade in small-object memorabilia, has recently spiked, while the history of these artifacts’ survival in the final days of WWII, liberation, and postwar rebuilding remains mostly unwritten. This talk introduced new research exploring pivotal moments in 1944-1950, as Allied occupiers, French leadership, and the population at large struggled to purge the country and continent of “pernicious objects.”
 
Dr. Sarah Griswold  is Assistant Professor of European History at Oklahoma State University, focusing on modern France
Co-Sponsor: Centre for the Study of France and the Francophone World Co-Sponsor: Centre for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies Co-Sponsor: Department of History Co-Sponsor: Department of French Co-Sponsor: Faculty of Arts and Science Co-Sponsor: Government of France, Cultural and Scientific Services, Ottawa Co-Sponsor: York University
Centre for the Study of France and the Francophone World, Centre for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (CERES), Europe & Eurasia
Tanyaa Mehta ceres.events@utoronto.ca

Speakers

Margaret Schotte

Associate Professor of History, York University

Sarah Griswold

Assistant Professor, Department of History, Oklahoma State University