Revolutions

Vocabulary

abolitionist: a person who favors the abolition of a practice or institution, esp. capital punishment or (formerly) slavery.

Alexander Kerensky: Alexander Fyodorovich Kerensky was a major political leader before and during the Russian Revolutions of 1917. Kerensky served as the second Prime Minister of the Russian Provisional Government until it was overthrown by the Bolsheviks under Vladimir Lenin in the October Revolution.

assembly line: a series of workers and machines in a factory by which a succession of identical items is progressively assembled.

bastille: a fortress built in Paris in the 14th century and used as a prison in the 17th and 18th centuries; it was destroyed July 14, 1789 at the start of the French Revolution

Bolshevik Party: The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903. The Bolsheviks were the majority faction in a crucial vote, hence their name.

boxer rebellion: The Boxer Rebellion, Boxer Uprising or Yihetuan Movement was a violent movement by the Righteous Harmony Society in China between 1899 and 1901. It expressed proto-nationalist sentiments and tried to eradicate opposing foreign imperialism and Christian missions.

Chiang Kai-shek: Chinese military and political figure; in the Chinese civil war that followed World War II he was defeated by the Chinese communists and in 1949 was forced to withdraw to Taiwan where he served as president of Nationalist China until his death (1897-1975)

communism: a political theory derived from Karl Marx, advocating class war and leading to a society in which all property is publicly owned and each person works and is paid according to their abilities and needs.

communists: a person who supports or believes in the principles of communism.

creoles: a person of mixed European and black descent, esp. in the Caribbean.

duma: a legislative body in the ruling assembly of Russia and of some other republics of the former Soviet Union.

French Revolution: the anticlerical and republican revolution in France from 1789 until 1799, when Napoleon seized power.
 
Grigory Rasputin: a Russian mystic and private adviser to the Romanovs, who became an influential figure in the later years of the tsar Nicolas' reign

Haitian Revolution: The Haitian Revolution was a slave revolt in the French colony of Saint-Domingue, which culminated in the elimination of slavery there and the founding of the Republic of Haiti. The Haitian Revolution was the only slave revolt which led to the founding of a state.

Industrial Revolution: the transformation from an agricultural to an industrial nation

Joseph Stalin: Russian leader who succeeded Lenin as head of the Communist Party and created a totalitarian state by purging all opposition (1879-1953)

Leon Trotsky: Russian revolutionary and Communist theorist who helped Lenin and built up the army; he was ousted from the Communist Party by Stalin and eventually assassinated in Mexico (1879-1940)

Louis XVI: king of France from 1774 to 1792; his failure to grant reforms led to the French Revolution; he and his queen (Marie Antoinette) were guillotined (1754-1793)

manifest destiny: the 19th-century doctrine or belief that the expansion of the US throughout the American continents was both justified and inevitable.

Mao Zedong: Chinese communist leader (1893-1976)

Marxism: the political and economic theories of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, later developed by their followers to form the basis for the theory and practice of communism.

Napoleon Bonaparte: French general who became emperor of the French (1769-1821)

nationalists: a person who advocates political independence for a country.

Nicholas II: the last czar of Russia who was forced to abdicate in 1917 by the Russian Revolution; he and his family were executed by the Bolsheviks (1868-1918)

reform: make changes in something in order to improve it.

reign of terror: a period of remorseless repression or bloodshed, in particular Reign of Terror, the period of the Terror during the French Revolution.

Robespierre: French revolutionary; leader of the Jacobins and architect of the Reign of Terror; was himself executed in a coup d'etat (1758-1794)

Russian Revolution: the coup d'etat by the Bolsheviks under Lenin in November 1917 that led to a period of civil war which ended in victory for the Bolsheviks in 1922

socialism: a political and economic theory of social organization that advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole.

soviet: an elected local, district, or national council in the former Soviet Union

The Enlightenment: a European intellectual movement of the late 17th and 18th centuries emphasizing reason and individualism rather than tradition. It was heavily influenced by 17th-century philosophers such as Descartes, Locke, and Newton, and its prominent exponents include Kant, Goethe, Voltaire, Rousseau, and Adam Smith.

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