This course will introduce students to the social, cultural, and political dimensions of the Atomic Age, which began with the detonation of the first nuclear weapon at the Trinity test in New Mexico on 16 July 1945. The devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that followed showcased the horrors of nuclear apocalypse and triggered an arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union that defined post-WWII international order. But it also led to the proliferation of potential peaceful nuclear technologies promising “atoms for peace” and a bright future across the so-called Iron Curtain, even as nuclear accidents brought suf-fering and unprecedented environmental degradation. What are the lasting political, social, cultural, and scientific legacies of the development of nuclear arsenals and technologies? How have people dealt with the consequences of uranium mining, plutonium production, nuclear disasters, and nuclear testing? How do the different stages of the nuclear fuel cycle, from uranium mining to nuclear waste storage, impact human and non-human forms of life and the environment today? By engaging with ethnographic material on all things nuclear in the United States, the Soviet Union, and the latter’s successor states, the course examines how the Atomic Age has shaped everyday life and culture in two seemingly different politi-co-economic systems and how nuclear technologies have been interpreted in different so-cio-cultural contexts. Along the way, students will develop a deeper understanding of issues of power and resistance, toxicity and contamination, health and illness, risk perceptions, social and environmental injustice, knowledge production, and colonialism.
Modulleistung: Hausarbeit
Besonderheiten: Der Kurs wird auf Englisch unterrichtet. Alle Studien- und Modulleistungen werden auf Englisch erbracht.
