Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2011 November 8

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November 8

French Winning the French and Indian War

If the French were to win the French and Indian War, is it more likely the British would cede the Thirteen Colonies, Rupert's Land or none at all to the French? 64.229.204.14 (talk) 01:59, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

It is impossible to answer speculative history questions unless an academic has formally published a counterfactual history. I would suggest searching for counterfactual history texts that speculate regarding the French and Indian War. There are a number of hobbyist grade forums or sites on the web. (varying from appalling neo-nationalist fantasies through to sub-academic grade, with some contributors having their counterfactuals academically published). Fifelfoo (talk) 02:32, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

First of all, "the Thirteen Colonies" did not exist as such until 1774 or so, at the earliest. Prior to 1776, there were an evolving number of British colonies in North America, including Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, and the Bahamas, and what later became "the Thirteen Colonies" did not yet have anything in common that distinguished them from other British colonies. Second, what Americans call the French and Indian War was just one theater of the Seven Years' War, a genuine world war involving the major European powers and conflicts in Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas. So, a French victory would have involved British concessions in regions other than the Americas, such as India. It's hard for me to imagine the French wanting to attempt control over more than a million disloyal English-speaking subjects in the colonies on the eastern seaboard of North America. More realistic would have been for the French to evict the English from thinly settled Rupert's Land, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and perhaps contested areas in what is now the state of Maine, so that the French would have unimpeded command of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Fur Trade. Probably, they would have demanded that the British also withdraw from frontier outposts such as Fort Pitt, and they might have forced the British to agree to French possession of the entire watersheds of the Great Lakes and Ohio Rivers. That would have given the French a better strategic position against the troublesome British-allied Iroquois. Of much greater interest to the French, however, would have been Britain's lucrative sugar-producing colonies in the Caribbean, such as Jamaica and Barbados. Marco polo (talk) 03:28, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Another posibility would have been if the French had pressed their advantage to expand in India. They had a foothold in Pondicherry; one would have to wonder if in winning the Seven Years War, France wouldn't have asked for further concessions from British India instead of North America. --Jayron32 05:32, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

There's no way to answer with any certainty a hypothetical question such as the one the OP poses. However, if by some extremely unlikely chance, the British had decided to just hand over all their North American colonies, the French would have probably had a helluva fight on their hands from the colonists themselves. See what Voltaire said about the impossibility of the French defending Canada, let alone the rest of the continent, given the enormous imbalance between Britain and France of population and resources in North America. Textorus (talk) 13:09, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

As far as the American colonists were concerned, didn't France essentially win the war anyway? I mean, Britain gained control of Canada, but the French Canadians had special privileges (or at least the Americans thought so) since they were allowed to speak French and remain Catholic, and they were allowed to settle in the Ohio valley. If France actually won the war and for some reason gained control of the American colonies, the Americans would definitely never have accepted that. I doubt France would have been able to afford to keep them anyway. This would probably just hasten both the American and French revolutions. But if France won the war and didn't gain control of the American colonies, and everything remained as it was, then the Americans would have at least one less grievance with Britain. Presumably Britain still would have issued the other Intolerable Acts though, so the only difference would be that all of Canada would have remained French, and would have been rather larger, at least for a little while. But then, if the American colonies still rebelled, I'm sure an independent United States would eventually conquer Canada. They often tried to do so anyway, and it would be significantly easier if it had remained French up to that point. Or they could have just bought it from France like they did with the Louisiana Purchase. Adam Bishop (talk) 13:42, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

No, the colonists, who still very much considered themselves loyal subjects of the British crown at that time, did not see the war as any kind of French victory. See French and Indian War. Textorus (talk) 14:15, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, a French victory in the Seven Years' War would have prevented one of the main irritants that led the 13 colonies to rebel, namely the Royal Proclamation of 1763. Without this proclamation and the adversarial relationship that it created between the colonies and London, the colonies might have been more willing to bear the burden of the British military presence, particularly if the British military had been willing to assist in a subsequent challenge to French control of the Ohio and Mississippi basins. I agree with Adam Bishop that demography made Anglo-American expansion westward into the Ohio and Mississippi basins all but inevitable, but it is possible that without the Proclamation of 1763, all of North America might have remained a loyal British dominion into the 19th century, and the Francophones of Quebec might have suffered a fate similar to those of Acadia and Louisiana, with the result that Quebec could have an Anglophone majority today. Ironically, the Quebecois might just owe their cultural survival to la Conquête. Marco polo (talk) 15:23, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that and the Quebec Act of 1774, which enshrined into British law the safeguarding of their laws, language, and culture. But as far as the other colonies were concerned, there were other irritants besides the 1763 proclamation: seems to me that it was that pigheaded insistence on taxation without representation that really put the kettle on the boil. As an old business prof of mine was famous for saying: "Economics wins out every time." Textorus (talk) 16:02, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not so sure. There were plenty of loyalists in the colonies who were willing to pay taxes and felt that a fair service was rendered by the crown in return. "No taxation without representation" was a slogan covering for a number of other grievances, including the ban on settlement west of the Appalachian divide and the ban on direct trade by colonial merchants with non-British colonies, enforced under the Townshend Acts. This enforcement involved the Quartering Act of 1765, another major irritant for the colonists, particularly in port cities such as Boston where the enforcement effort was greatest. These two measures together united the mercantile elite and the masses (who were forced to lodge disrespectful and sometimes drunken British soldiers in their homes) in opposition to British rule. If, however, British troops had been directed against the French and not against the English colonists, the resistance to taxation and the grievances I have mentioned would have been diminished. Also, if Britain had lost its sugar colonies in the Caribbean, it would presumably have been less repressive toward New England merchants trading with French and Spanish colonies, since these merchants would no longer be depriving the crown of income from sugar and rum production. Marco polo (talk) 16:38, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree, there were many irritants, although the taxation w/out representation issue was certainly not a minor one, being hotly debated in Parliament, as well as the subject of numerous outraged tracts on both sides. Even the scholarly Dr. Johnson was moved to issue a pamphlet on the subject - not, alas, in sympathy with the "treasonous" Americans. But as you say, there were indeed many colonists who would have been happy not to rock the boat - somewhere in my history classes, I remember being told (rightly or wrongly, as the case may be) that about a third were all in favor of the Revolution, a third strongly opposed, and a third who just shrugged and said, Whatever. Still, I can't imagine the centralizing French would have had an easy time ruling the colonies, already quite used to governing themselves and well accustomed to running overweening royal governors out of town; especially so if the French had made any move to impose their language, laws, and state Catholicism, or to forbid trade with Britain, a major market. They could only have done it, with very great difficulty, by an overwhelming show of force spread throughout the colonies, but how long could they have kept that up? - hence my question below about relative military strengths in that era. I imagine the whole thing would have ended in revolution sooner or later, and probably sooner, no matter which imperial power was in charge, don't you? Textorus (talk) 17:35, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Psychological disorder in literature

Is there any fiction dealing with schizophrenia, major depressive disorder, bipolar disorder, personality disorders and sexual and gender disorders? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.29.34.87 (talk) 04:23, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Schizophrenia: I Never Promised You a Rose Garden (novel), Category:Fictional portrayals of schizophrenia.

Bipolar Disorder: Category:Bipolar disorder in fiction.

Depression: The Trick is to Keep Breathing (novel).

Sexual and gender disorders: Child of God, Woman's World (novel), The Silence of the Lambs (novel)

See also: Mental illness in fiction. --Colapeninsula (talk) 09:40, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

And Dissociative identity disorder in popular culture. --Colapeninsula (talk) 12:52, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

colonialism in literature

Is there any fiction based on the following colonialism:

A) British?
B) French?
C) Italian?
D) Spanish?
E) Portuguese?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.29.34.87 (talk) 04:27, 8 November 2011 (UTC) 

Yes, there would be plenty of examples of each one. Rudyard Kipling would be one author mentioned for a). --Soman (talk) 06:47, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Spanish colonialism is central to Aztec by Gary Jennings. The novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey is set in the spanish colonial Viceroyalty of Peru, though I don't recall colonialism per se being a central theme. French Colonialsm is a theme of the fictional works of the existentialist author Albert Camus; his novel The Stranger is set in French Algeria. British colonialism plays a major role in the Chinua Achebe novel Things Fall Apart which is perhaps the best known work of modern West African literature. --Jayron32 07:02, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

The classic Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus by Orson Scott Card for a more recent work(I don't much care for his IRL politics, but he writes a good yarn). Also, Conversations with the High Priest of Coosa by Charles M Hudson Heiro 07:15, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

The works of H. Rider Haggard and James Fenimore Cooper. Of course, this whole page may also be helpful for A British Empire in fiction. Also, The Quiet American by Graham Greene is about American colonialism, and the aftereffects of British and French colonialism. Heiro 07:32, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

See also Latin American literature, African literature, Indian literature, Angolan literature, etc. --Colapeninsula (talk) 09:45, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

On French colonialism, Marguerite Duras' novels set in Indochina are excellent. Tierno Monenembo recently won the Prix Renaudot for a novel about the colonization of what is now Guinée (The King of Kahel). There is a long tradition of Africans writing about the French colonial period; Camara Laye, Mongo Beti, Cheikh Hamidou Kane and Ferdinand Oyono all authored what are now considered classic novels about the period. J.M.G. Le Clezio has written a number of novels about colonial Africa and the Indian Ocean islands from a French point-of-view. Older writers include Pierre Loti who wrote a number of novels set in 19th century French colonies, and going back even further Bernardin de Saint-Pierre's Paul et Virginie is set in La Réunion in the 18th century. And that's just scratching the surface of the topic. --Xuxl (talk) 10:50, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Cry, the Beloved Country possibly for British/Dutch colonialism depending on how you count effects like apartheid. Was standard high school reading in the U.S. in my day along with Heart of Darkness. I doubt it still is. 75.41.110.200 (talk) 14:53, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm surprised that no one has mentioned Chinua Achebe, who wrote some of the most renowned examples of post-colonial literature. Writers responding to French colonialism include Aimé Césaire and other writers of the Négritude movement. Angolan literature includes many works responding to Portuguese colonialism, including those of José Luandino Vieira. Marco polo (talk) 15:15, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Jayron did, above. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 15:54, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Oops. Sorry for my inattention. Marco polo (talk) 16:22, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Plot summary for all the above (Spoiler alert!): It sucks to be ruled by foreigners you didn't elect. But then, it also sucks to be ruled by your own people whom you didn't elect. Or did elect. So any way the story goes, life is a bitch, and then you die. The end.  ;) Textorus (talk) 15:52, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo were two thinly veiled works of fiction critical of the Spanish colonial government in the Philippines. Published at the end of the 19th century, they were banned and the author (José Rizal, now the Philippine national hero) executed by firing squad.-- Obsidi♠n Soul 11:24, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Britain vs. France, late 18th century

As a riff off the question asked above, I'm wondering what the relative military strength of the two countries was. The article French and Indian War gives comparative troop numbers in North America, but Seven Years' War doesn't seem to give figures for their forces in the rest of the world. So specifically, I'm asking this limited question, if anyone can answer it: globally speaking, what were the total number of troops and total number of warships belonging to Britain and to France - let's ignore all other countries/allies for the moment - either in 1754, or in 1763. Textorus (talk) 16:20, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

I know there is detailed information for both navies, at least...I wrote an essay about this very subject way back in my first year of undergrad. But I can't remember what books I used now, so it might take some digging to find some numbers. For France, there seems to be some lists in the appendices of "The French Navy and the Seven Years' War" by Jonathan R. Dull, but I can't see them on Google Books. Adam Bishop (talk) 18:35, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

From The command of the ocean, pp. 607-608; English and French fleets, 1750-1765: Ships of the line, England 115-139; France 45-59. Cruisers, England 74-115; France 21-31. Not sure about troops--I suspect the two were more on par in that regard. In North America I think France was able to muster greater numbers of Native American fighters as well. That fleet chart also shows how after the Seven Years War the combined French and Spanish fleets came to equal the British, an arms race that perhaps points directly to the Battle of Trafalgar. Pfly (talk) 23:43, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I suspected that England had the edge in seapower, thanks. Textorus (talk) 01:00, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Ah, here's some figures on total army sizes during the Seven Years War. Britain, "between 1756 and 1763...the size of the army exceeded 90,000 men" (The sinews of power pp. 31-32). Other army sizes from The Seven Years War pp. 20-24: France, "over 200,000"; Russia, 333,000; Austria in 1756, 201,000; and Prussia at the start of the war, 145,000. Apparently "over 200,000" was a "low point" for the French Army of the 18th century. (I know I know, I didn't ignore other countries like you asked, just thought the figures gave additional context to British and French military power) Pfly (talk) 06:22, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

So the French army outnumbered the British by 2:1 at least. At first glance, I would assume that is because France as a continental power had more need of land forces than England, relying on its "moat defensive" and the Royal Navy. Then too, perhaps France had a larger population at that time. Brewer's book is most interesting, thanks for the link. Textorus (talk) 14:06, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Gibbon, a contemporary, estimated French population at 25,000,000; British population at 8 to 12 millions. He may well have been off (so may modern estimates), but the proportion is roughly correct. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:21, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Aushev tapes of the Beslan school hostage crisis

I am interesting in finding an unedited, complete copy of the "Aushev tapes" of the Beslan school hostage crisis. Since I do not know Russian, I am not sure where the unedited, complete copies of the tapes are on the internet. Where would I find them? WhisperToMe (talk) 16:44, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Why do you believe it is on the internet? Beslan school hostage crisis#Secret video materials suggests only fragments of the tape have ever leaked, the entire tape is either locked up in some Russian government archive or destroyed. If the entire tape had leaked out, I presume this would have been noted in English sources so if you can't find any mention of it leaking, it probably hasn't happened. (I looked briefly but not that hard for any mention of the complete tape leaking.) There is evidentally another tape which our article earlier suggested was the Aushev tape but if you read the sources, probably isn't. It's not clear to me if this tape has ever been publicly released in its entirety (well what remains of it, it was damaged), it was acquired by CBS News and it sounds like the people who found it may still have a copy but this doesn't definitely mean it's been publicly released in its entirety. Nil Einne (talk) 17:18, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

There was the CBS section, but when I saw a documentary I saw additional segments showing more of the same masked men (such as the one with the green camo mask) that I didn't see in the CBS footage. I know the Beslan families have seen even more segments (one family identified a group of three girls cowering in a corner. All three were killed by a grenade) WhisperToMe (talk) 15:29, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Okay, what I mean is a full version of the exact video described at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3636196.stm

The BBC had a link, but unfortunately it's broken

WhisperToMe (talk) 23:11, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Czech Price Signs

I've just returned from Prague and I've noticed this on a great many signs in shop windows. The price is written like this: "100,-". Here's an image to illustrate: http://www.travelsinparadise.com/czech/trebon/pictures/u-vitus-menu.jpg. Why the comma and dash? --Rixxin (talk) 16:47, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

This is the standard way of writing prices in many parts of Europe. The comma takes the place of the full stop in decimal numbers. The Czech koruna is notionally divided up into 100 hellers, although I don't think you will ever find prices in anything other than round koruna. So the price on your example is 100 koruna. Why do they write the comma and dash even though there are no hellers anymore? Just out of tradition and habit, I think. --Viennese Waltz 16:55, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

My first thought was some sort of sub unit, like a (Sterling) penny to a pound, but not having seen anything needing less than 5 koruna (to use the toilet at a tourist trap) I couldn't quite fathom what you would buy with 1/100th of a koruna! Dust? --Rixxin (talk) 17:22, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

I was last in Prague in 1999, and I think they still had 10 and 20-heller coins in circulation then, as well as half-korunas - hell, you could still find the occasional 20-korun note still in circulation then. All gone now, of course, and I see from our article on the Czech koruna that even the 50-korun note has gone this past year. Even then, unless you were buying cheese or something similar, you very rarely got a price which was anything other than a whole koruna. -- Arwel Parry (talk) 23:40, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

These conventions for writing currency amounts seem to be very persistent. Before Portugal joined the Euro, amounts in Escudos used to be written in the form 100$$00, with the $$ (I've used the Dollar sign for simplicity: it's actually another special character) acting as both currency symbol and decimal separator. In recent years the Escudo was already a very small unit (about 250 to the GBP, IIRC) so there was no chance of the Centavos being anything other than 00. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 17:41, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

You sometimes see it in price lists in the anglo-West, even where nobody would ever expect an item to cost anything other than a whole dollar amount. Such as training courses, where prices are typically whole multiples of $50. Some lists will still be, e.g. Course A = $600.00, Course B = $550.00, Course C = $650.00 and so on. Drives me crazy. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 18:49, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Well at least that's a change from them being $599.99 and the like. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 19:55, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

The notation is similar to the old British shillings (e.g. 5/-) where there was a solidus and a dash. We were forced to abandon this notation here! Dbfirs 09:38, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

But that's because 5 on its own would be ambiguous. It was also possible to write 5s for five shillings. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 10:45, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

True, but I was just pointing out that punctuation followed by a dash is not restricted to the Czech crown. Dbfirs 17:21, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

One name for the 'slash' or 'solidus' is virgule, but in French that means 'comma'! --ColinFine (talk) 23:47, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, Colin! I should have thought of that! Dbfirs 07:57, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I found a few receipts and coruna plus hellers are used in the NET price in pubs, eg 0,5l of Pilsener beer costs 32,90. However, once the various surcharges (primarily VAT of 20% and bits I don´t understand) are added, the total always seems to be a round Koruna value. BTW, the CZK 5 for toilets seems to be universal. You pay the same in any metro station. Seeing these places are spotless and devoid of used syringes in the rubbish bin, I gladly donated a pee. --Incognito.ergo.possum (talk) 18:46, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

The had haler coins until a few years ago, so it wasn't too long ago when a mint or some other tiny thing might cost 5.5 crowns. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 23:33, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Cashiers often write £20— rather than £20.00, probably because of the effort. Also, I noticed while in Russia they still charge you by the individual kopek, (about 0.02p/0.03UScents - since 1 rouble is about 2p). In practice I think people round it up. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 10:05, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Which mental illness did Greenberg had?

From Greenberg (film) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.2.162.175 (talk) 19:57, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

I found what purports to be the shooting script online, after wading through many horrible fake download pages trying to download malware to my machine, and after skimming it, the most concrete statement about this that I found was on page 5 when Carol says that he had a "nervous breakdown". The script is vague everywhere else, with lines like "I blew a lunatic". Comet Tuttle (talk) 22:49, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

It's not specified. You can still speculate what matches his symptoms - mainly being pissed off, relentless, wanting to go away and leave everything behind - but the film didn't make it a central aspect of the plot (if there is a plot at the film). Quest09 (talk) 01:37, 9 November 2011 (UTC)