My research examines the case of Joseph Vacher, one of the most prolific serial murderers in French history, as a micro- historical study to analyze the evolution of criminal theory and application of the insanity defense over the course of the Belle Époque, as French judicial systems and medico-legal experts attempted to cope with the emerging psychiatric distinction between mental illness and personality disorders. Historically, attempts to explain seemingly unmotivated homicides left a narrow margain for mitigating factors, aside from pleas of insanity. The success of such pleas reflected the conviction that these crimes could only result from severe mental incapacity. Nevertheless, in the late nineteenth century, there emerged a new medical perspective, the sadism diagnosis. Those involved in the realm of criminal behavior began to entertain the possibility that certain individuals might commit violent acts in pursuit of pleasure while maintaining full command of their reason.

A study of the personal rule of the seventeenth century French king, Louis XIV analyzing his decision making process as an absolutist ruler. A special focus on Louis' foreign policy influences and how he conducted his government including the roles of ministers, ambassadors, the French court and nobility, and councils in the way he made decisions.

This thesis in partial fulfillment of my degree from Barrett, the Honors College at Arizona State University delves into the career and viewpoints of Elizabeth Banks, a nineteenth-century American journalist who traveled to London in the 1890s to write about differences between American and British culture and lifestyles. Her three books include Campaigns of Curiosity: Journalistic Adventures of an American Girl in London (1894), The Autobiography of a "Newspaper Girl" (1902), and The Remaking of an American (1928). Banks asked that all of her personal documents be destroyed after her death, so these published books serve as the only remnant of her transatlantic life. With that in mind, I approached the documents with the idea that Banks chose what to include, what to exclude, and how to present her persona as opposed to giving a complete, unbiased picture. Banks used these books to formulate a public identity that served her purposes, which makes sense considering she needed the approval of her readership in order to subsist financially. The contradictions among the three works, and even within each individual work, allowed Banks to appear nonthreatening to the status quo, but still interesting enough to deserve attention. While the context of her environment experienced changes, so did her public "performance." She altered her image in conjunction with what she identified as important to her readers. I rely on a careful reading of her three published books, contextualized with secondary sources to understand how Elizabeth Banks constructed a public identity during a time characterized by social shifts, especially due to the rise of the women's movement, an interest in access to rights previously reserved for men, and reevaluation of the relationship between the social classes. This thesis takes an interdisciplinary approach that utilizes concepts from women and gender studies to better analyze Banks and her lived experiences. While other research on Elizabeth Banks reaches the same conclusions I do, and while other historians have identified Banks's public character as complex and contradictory, this work focuses specifically on how these contradictions operated. By placing portions of her works directly alongside one another, and by analyzing exactly how she incorporated differing ideologies into her pieces, her public identity can be more fully understood as multifaceted and existing in relation to society's changing demands. Also, this thesis considers the importance of the social constructs of class and gender to Banks's identity. The first chapter focuses on gender and her experience as a woman journalist. The second chapter deals with class politics as they impacted her work. Even though I address these social identities in separate chapters, I approached Banks with intersectionality in mind, as Banks's experience of gender is related to class, and vice versa. Elizabeth Banks crafted her public identity in conjunction to public opinion. She knew that she required the approval of her readers. By policing boundaries created by gender and class, she appears as an outsider looking in. She blurs the lines between masculine and feminine and middle class and working class. She does not firmly set herself in any one group, which allowed her to expand her appeal. This analysis of Banks illuminates how a woman could effectively navigate the public arena in nineteenth-century England.

This paper analyzes the British people’s attitudes towards the French people both before and after the French Revolution. It looks at how the French émigrés played a role in shaping these attitudes. To analyze the opinions of the British people prior to the French Revolution travel diaries are used. These travel diaries identify the stereotypes of the French people given by the British. The French Revolution prompted the immigration of French people to England. This immigration led to a change in treatment towards the French people. Kirsty Carpenter was a pioneer in researching the role émigrés played in changing British attitudes towards the French. During the Revolution a variety of sources are used to examine what the British thought of the émigrés. Memories of Frances Burney and Comtesse du Boigne are used. In addition, articles and reports found in newspapers like The Observer. Also, editorial and political writings by Henry Dundas and Edmund Burke are used. In general, after analyzing these sources it is seen that British attitudes towards the French people differed with the introduction of French émigrés during the French Revolution. Prior to the French Revolution, many British people thought of the French as foolish, vain, and lazy. The French emigrants elicited a sympathetic response from the British people. The differing attitudes towards the French people can be explained by the dire circumstances of the emigrants, the violent nature of the Revolution, and the increased contact between the French and British people.

This thesis explores the wide-ranging urban renovations of Paris that the Second Empire, led by Emperor Napoleon III, commissioned from 1853-1870. The complex nature of redesigning the French capital required the oversight of the prefect of the Seine under Napoleon III, Georges-Eugène Haussmann, a man who popularized not only the appearance of Paris as it is known today but also the innovative means of financing projects of such large magnitudes. Ordering for wider streets to accommodate the flow of traffic from a rapidly growing population in the nineteenth century, the city government of Paris saw an opportunity to modernize completely its urban area in a functional manner by implementing new water and sewer systems, municipal parks, street lighting, and uniform façades. The comprehensive nature of this undertaking constituted one of the first instances of modern urban planning. While the massive construction projects did displace many of the residents of the city's core, they fundamentally transformed Paris from a medieval town notorious for its malodorous stench, overcrowding, and disease to one of the world's most celebrated and visited cities.

Women. War. What is the relationship between women and war? As evidenced by movies, popular memoirs and journals, there is a definite relationship between men and war. However, this definite relationship has created a problematic and a complex relationship between women and war. The two historical events that are considered as the ‘turning points’ for women are the French Revolution and World War I are compared in this thesis. The popular perception of women’s legacy of the French Revolution is that the Revolution cultivated the ideas of Republican Motherhood and the Cult of Domesticity while World War I catapulted women to the public sphere. These two contrasting legacies are compared to see if French women’s lived experiences, memories, and writings verify these popular perceptions. Or, do the writings of the French women present a different argument? The thesis compares the writings and the lived experiences of the French women through three different themes: the argument for political rights, victimization and agency, and gendered connections (the development of sisterhood for the Revolution) or gendered divides (women’s role on the home and war front). In addition, these three themes come together to show how it is difficult to come up with a collective, public memory.