Free lecture series takes place three Thursdays this semester
Join in on the Third Annual Military History Lecture Series. Kirkwood faculty members will present lectures the first two Thursdays, and a community member will present the final, all taking a look at fascinating aspects of military history. This year the series highlights the global impact of imperialism as practiced by colonial powers at varying stages of decay and expansion. All talks are held in 3008 Cedar Hall on Thursdays, during rom 11-11:50 a.m.
Thursday, November 15th
“Guerra con Guerra: Total War & the Birth of Concentration Camps in Wartime Cuba”
Hoping to deliver a final blow against their colonial masters, Cuban rebels took extreme measures – scorched earth campaigns against profitable sugar fields and revenge killings of known collaborators. Spain, in the late 1890s, unwilling to give up one of its last vestiges of power in the New World, held on and responded in kind: infamous bandos declaring the policy of “reconcentración” – introduced concentration camps into modern conflict.
–Lecture from Laura Lacasa Yost, Distance Learning/Social Sciences
Thursday, November 29th
“Africa to Auschwitz: The Namibian Genocide (1904-1908)”
The Nazi Holocaust is well known, but it was not the first time Germany attempted to annihilate entire groups of humans. Under the German Second Reich, the first genocide of the twentieth century was perpetrated. In the German colony in South West Africa, the Herero and Nama tribes were targeted for extermination, driven into the desert and rounded up in concentration camps.
–Lecture from Robinson Yost, Social Sciences
Thursday, December 6th
“The Chiricahua Apache: The Lost Tribe of Arizona”
From the earliest years of the new American West, following the Mexican-American War, the Chiricahua Apache and the United States government were at odds over territorial control of “Apacheria,” a vast section of the Southwest, including parts of New Mexico, Arizona and northern Mexico. The American-Apache Wars, concluding in 1886, were the last of the major Indian wars. Following Geronimo’s surrender to General Nelson Miles, the once proud Chiricahua’s were removed from their Arizona homeland to Florida as prisoners of war. They have never returned.
–Lecture from Stuart Rosebrook, freelance historian & writer