Howard Brown | Source | Professor of History at Binghamton University, State University of New York
Howard Brown
Howard G. Brown is an historian of France between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries, with a special interest in politicized violence. His previous book, Ending the French Revolution: Violence, Justice, and Repression from the Terror to Napoleon (winner of the AHA’s Gershoy Award), argues that despite the ringing slogans of 1789, liberal democracy was not the most significant outcome of the French Revolution. Rather, after years of politicized violence and perverted justice, of regional revolt, endemic banditry, citizen juries, and militarized policing, France's illiberal democracy quickly gave way to a modern "security state." His newest book, Mass Violence and the Self: From the French Wars of Religion to the Paris Commune, explores the earliest visual and textual depictions of personal suffering caused by the French Wars of Religion (1562–98), the Fronde (1648–52), the French Revolutionary Terror (1793–94), and the Paris Commune (1871). This richly illustrated and conceptually innovative book shows how increasingly effective communication of suffering through various novel media from wood-block printing to photography helped to provoke major collective traumas and stimulate the psychological processes of the self.
-
Binghamton University, State University of New York
Professor of History
-
Binghamton Faculty Focus - How Representations of Mass Violence Can Shape Collective Identities
This video contains historical images of deceased persons. Viewer discretion advised. Howard G. Brown is a professor of history at Binghamton University, specializing in French history from the 16th to the 19th centuries. His research centers on the representations of mass violence within French history, focusing on the impact these evolving representations had on collective identity and helped to provoke major collective traumas and stimulate the psychological processes of the self. Faculty Profile: https://www.binghamton.edu/history/faculty/profile.html?id=hgbrown See more Faculty Focus Videos: https://www.binghamton.edu/communications-and-marketing/media-public-relations/faculty-focus.html http://www.binghamton.edu
Article
-
"Napoleon," the new film from Ridley Scott and starring Joaquin Phoenix, is coming out in theatres, but will it get the facts straight? Howard Brown, expert on the French Revolution and professor of history at Binghamton University, State University of New York, believes that the film will likely omit certain facts about the famous leader. Here are a few:
1. When Napoleon Bonaparte met “Joséphine” she was named Rose de Beauharnais. He gave her the new name, probably out of admiration for his older brother Joseph. That it stuck testifies to his ability to impose what he wanted on others.
2. Napoleon’s charisma came partly from his charming smile, which actors never try to portray. (This is because no contemporary paintings show his smile; at the time, depicting teeth was reserved for denigrating the lower classes as vulgar. Besides, even members of the elite had bad teeth due to primitive dentistry and the ravages of sugar.) This means that another aspect of his character – his quick-witted banter and ease of laughter – are also never shown.
3. Filmmakers adore pomp and circumstance, so they gravitate to those set-piece moments in Napoleon’s life when he was at his most glorious. However, Napoleon was an aesthete. He did not seek luxury for himself personally. He slept on a folding camp cot more often than on a puffy mattress. He also did not like feasts. Not only did he lack a taste for fancy cuisines or rare wines, but he considered eating to be strictly utilitarian and, therefore, ate very quickly.
4. Napoleon was both a charismatic army commander and a micromanaging bureaucrat. He actually spent most of his time dictating instructions about a myriad of things that were far beneath his purview. The range is mind-boggling, as is the timing of his interventions. For example, he dictated regulations for a girls’ school from a ramshackle outbuilding the evening before Austerlitz, his greatest victory.
5. During his final years on St. Helena, he became depressed, grew a full beard, and often hid away like a recluse. However, despite stomach cancer and other ailments, he refused to commit suicide, not because he feared death, but because doing so would have given too much satisfaction to his enemies.
