Date Awarded
Spring 2016
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (M.A.)
Department
History
Advisor
Nicholas Popper
Committee Member
Guillaume Auber
Committee Member
Leisa Meyer
Abstract
The Mind of the State Throughout the War of the Spanish Succession, European powers vied for supremacy, both on the Continent and across the Atlantic. This paper examines the English intelligence apparatus during this conflict. In so doing, it shows the extent to which intelligence shaped state functions during the conflict, and how understandings of intelligence and information in general influenced state understandings of the international stage and their approaches to conflict. Thinking About Sex In the early 1720s, the British state launched a series of raids against molly houses – social spaces patronized by homosexual men – across the country. This paper explores discursive developments from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries in an attempt to understand what allowed the British state to understand homosexual individuals and from what avenues they derived their authority. Ultimately, drawing upon Foucauldian analysis, the paper considers developments in intelligence as critical to state understandings of sex and sexuality during the period.
DOI
http://doi.org/10.21220/S2KK53
Rights
© The Author
Recommended Citation
Munda, Brandon Wayne Dylan, "The Mind of the State and Thinking about Sex" (2016). Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects. William & Mary. Paper 1477068554.
http://doi.org/10.21220/S2KK53
