A blafard is an imaginary creature purportedly found in the early United States. Blafards, also called "kackerlackes", were "strange albinos long surmised to be the result of some kind of simian crossbreeding", but of an "accidental variety". Blafards were imagined by Europeans, notably Cornelius De Pauw in the 18th century. This creature was a symbol of the degeneration of America in the minds of Europeans, along with the "hermaphrodite", which "epitomized Americans' sexual disorder. [1]
Blafards were imagined to be "caused by a deficiency 'in their parents' spermatic liquor'" and were "absolutely deprived of the power of generation, or did not engender children that resemble them". [2]
Blafards were a manifestation of the early Anti-Americanism that originated in Europe in the 18th century. Their earliest mention is in the works of Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon and Cornelius De Pauw.
A bestiary is a compendium of beasts. Originating in the ancient world, bestiaries were made popular in the Middle Ages in illustrated volumes that described various animals and even rocks. The natural history and illustration of each beast was usually accompanied by a moral lesson. This reflected the belief that the world itself was the Word of God and that every living thing had its own special meaning. For example, the pelican, which was believed to tear open its breast to bring its young to life with its own blood, was a living representation of Jesus. Thus the bestiary is also a reference to the symbolic language of animals in Western Christian art and literature.
François-Marie Arouet, known by his nom de plumeVoltaire, was a French Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher famous for his wit, his criticism of Christianity—especially the Roman Catholic Church—and of slavery, as well as his advocacy of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and separation of church and state.
Right-wing politics is generally defined by support of the view that certain social orders and hierarchies are inevitable, natural, normal, or desirable, typically supporting this position on the basis of natural law, economics, authority or tradition. Hierarchy and inequality may be seen as natural results of traditional social differences or competition in market economies. Right-wing politics are considered the counterpart to left-wing politics, and the left–right political spectrum is one of the most widely accepted political spectrums.
Chivalry, or the chivalric code, is an informal and varying code of conduct developed between 1170 and 1220. It was associated with the medieval Christian institution of knighthood; knights' and gentlemen's behaviours were governed by chivalrous social codes. The ideals of chivalry were popularized in medieval literature, particularly the literary cycles known as the Matter of France, relating to the legendary companions of Charlemagne and his men-at-arms, the paladins, and the Matter of Britain, informed by Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae, written in the 1130s, which popularized the legend of King Arthur and his knights of the Round Table. All of these were taken as historically accurate until the beginnings of modern scholarship in the 19th century.
Anti-Americanism is prejudice, fear or hatred of the United States, its government, its foreign policy, or Americans in general.
Clerical fascism is an ideology that combines the political and economic doctrines of fascism with clericalism. The term has been used to describe organizations and movements that combine religious elements with fascism, receive support from religious organizations which espouse sympathy for fascism, or fascist regimes in which clergy play a leading role.
Philippe Marie Jean Joseph Le Jolis de Villiers de Saintignon, known as Philippe de Villiers, is a French entrepreneur, politician and novelist. He is the founder of the Puy du Fou theme park in Vendée, which is centred around the history of France. Appointed Secretary of State for Culture in 1986 by President François Mitterrand, de Villiers entered the National Assembly the following year and the European Parliament in 1994.
France was the first ally of the new United States in 1778. The 1778 treaty and military support proved decisive in the American victory over Britain in the American Revolutionary War. France fared poorly, with few gains and heavy debts, which were contributing causes of France's own revolution and eventual transition to a republic.
Anti-German sentiment is opposition to or fear of Germany, its inhabitants, its culture, or its language. Its opposite is Germanophilia.
Jean Albert Gaudry, French geologist and palaeontologist, was born at St Germain-en-Laye, and was educated at the Collège Stanislas de Paris. He was a notable proponent of theistic evolution.
Jean-Baptiste du Val-de-Grâce, baron de Cloots, better known as Anacharsis Cloots, was a Prussian nobleman who was a significant figure in the French Revolution. Perhaps the first to advocate a world parliament, long before Albert Camus and Albert Einstein, he was a world federalist and an internationalist anarchist. He was nicknamed "orator of mankind", "citoyen de l'humanité" and "a personal enemy of God".
Cornelius Franciscus de Pauw or Cornelis de Pauw was a Dutch philosopher, geographer and diplomat at the court of Frederick the Great of Prussia.
Anti-Europeanism and Europhobia are political terms used in a variety of contexts, implying sentiment or policies in opposition to Europe.
Michel Wieviorka is a French sociologist, noted for his work on violence, terrorism, racism, social movements and the theory of social change.
André Siegfried was a French academic, geographer and political writer best known to English speakers for his commentaries on American, Canadian, and British politics.
The 1804 Haiti massacre was carried out against the French population and white Saint Dominicans remaining in Haiti following the Haitian Revolution, by soldiers, mostly former slaves, under orders from Jean-Jacques Dessalines. He had decreed that all suspected of conspiring in the acts of the expelled army should be put to death. From early January 1804 until 22 April 1804, squads of soldiers moved from house to house throughout Haiti, torturing and killing entire families. Eyewitness accounts of the massacre describe imprisonment and killings even of whites who had been friendly and sympathetic to the black population. Between 3,000 and 5,000 people were killed.
Socialisme ou Barbarie was a French-based radical libertarian socialist group of the post-World War II period whose name comes from a phrase which was misattributed to Friedrich Engels by Rosa Luxemburg in The Junius Pamphlet, but which probably was most likely first used by Karl Kautsky. It existed from 1948 until 1967. The animating personality was Cornelius Castoriadis, also known as Pierre Chaulieu or Paul Cardan. Socialisme ou Barbarie is also the name of the group's journal.
Humanist Photography, also known as the School of Humanist Photography, manifests the Enlightenment philosophical system in social documentary practice based on a perception of social change. It emerged in the mid-twentieth-century and is associated most strongly with Europe, particularly France, where the upheavals of the two world wars originated, though it was a worldwide movement. It can be distinguished from photojournalism, with which it forms a sub-class of reportage, as it is concerned more broadly with everyday human experience, to witness mannerisms and customs, than with newsworthy events, though practitioners are conscious of conveying particular conditions and social trends, often, but not exclusively, concentrating on the underclasses or those disadvantaged by conflict, economic hardship or prejudice. Humanist photography "affirms the idea of a universal underlying human nature". Jean Claude Gautrand describes humanist photography as:
a lyrical trend, warm, fervent, and responsive to the sufferings of humanity [which] began to assert itself during the 1950s in Europe, particularly in France ... photographers dreamed of a world of mutual succour and compassion, encapsulated ideally in a solicitous vision.
Roger Lawrence Williams, was an American historian with major interests in French political history, particularly the Second Empire associated with Napoleon III. He served on the faculty in History departments at several universities, becoming department head at three. He was a founding member of the Society for French Historical Studies. In later years he developed a keen interest in botany, and wrote extensively on that subject, especially its early history in France. Williams did not marry and left his estate to the Wyoming Community Foundation.