Date: Every Friday at 11:40 am Place: Room C17, Sociology Department, Charles University (Celetná 13, Praha 1) Lecturer: Julien Wacquez (CEFRES/EHESS Paris) Language: English
Syllabus
From public authorities struggling with the existence of climate change to notions such as “post-truth” or “post-factual” making the headlines, the recent years have brought a constant questioning of the role of knowledge in today’s polities. Is climate-change a hoax, as claimed by the current US president? Are Western democracies threatened by false information and “post-truths”? Who produces the knowledge we are using and to what purposes? And, in the end, what does it mean “to know” something in today’s cultures?
Date: Every Tuesday at 03:30 pm Place: FHS UK, Jinonice building Lecturer: Martin Pjecha Language: English
Syllabus
The aim of the course will be to present students to the religious thought and controversies over the Western middle-ages, especially focusing on the 11th to 15th centuries. In approaching the topic from an ‘emic’ perspective, the course will necessarily refer to the philosophical, historical, and political weltanschauung which contemporary ‘religious’ agents drew from. The first half will be devoted to the historical background of early Christianity and its key thinkers, as well as the dominant conceptual and methodological concerns involved in studying “sectarian” or “heretical” groups. We will also introduce the most persistent symbolic forms of opposition to “orthodoxy”: Gnosticism, Mysticism, and Apocalypticism. Several case studies will then be presented, spanning the temporal and geographic range of Latin Christendom. The lectures will provide the relevant historical background, while the interactive seminar portion will introduce discussion of short primary texts and issues.
A course at the Department of Roman Studies of the Faculty of Arts, Charles University
Time and venue: Every Wednesday from 5:30 to 7:00 pm, room 217, FF UK, nam. Jan Palacha 2 Lecturers: Chiara Mengozzi, Ph.D. and Mgr. Vojtěch Šarše Language: French
Syllabus
The “post” in postcolonial not only alludes to the era following decolonization, but hints first and foremost to the set of practices of resisting colonialism, colonialist ideologies and contemporary forms of domination and subjugation. Our course aims at understanding the political, cultural and linguistic problems framed by European colonization and its legacies. Based on the reading of iconic theoretical texts of the postcolonial thought (by Césaire, Fanon, Saïd, Spivak, Mbembe, Bhabha, Thiong’o) and on the textual analysis of a few French and Francophone literary works (from Africa and the Caribbean), the course will revisit the literary canon through the lenses of power relationships between individuals, languages and cultures. It will highlight the stylistic and topical features of novels written by authors from the ex-French colonies and the Overseas Territories such as: the relationship to French language, exclusion/inclusion, feeling of in-betweenness, national allegories, master-slave dialectic, or the rewriting of history.
„Habsburger Pfau“ mit den Wappen der Herrschaften des Hauses Habsburg, 1555
A seminar hosted by CEFRES young researcher Katalin Pataki
Time & Venue: every Wednesday 15:50-17:30 pm, FF UK Jan Palach building, room 209 Lecturer: Katalin Pataki – Central European University (CEU) / CEFRES) Language: English Contact: katalin.pataki@cefres.cz
Outline
The course sets into focus the history of the Habsburg Monarchy in the early modern era, mainly covering the period between 1556-1806. In the first half of the course, there will be a strong emphasis on the spatial manifestations of state power: the political geography of the Habsburg territories will be investigated in detail: the territorial fragmentation of the individual provinces, their urban centers, the ethnical and confessional landscape will be considered. Simultaneously, the phenomenon of the composite state and the kinds of challenges peculiar to such states will be discussed. The course will investigate how policy making could or could not ensure the efficient exercise of political authority and management of resources, and what kind of legal, institutional, bureaucratic and other devices could facilitate “good government”.
The course aims to develop a comprehensive and critical understanding of European state formation in a fresh perspective, by providing an up-to-date understanding of state formation processes and going beyond the stereotypical presentation of the political and institutional history of the Habsburg Monarchy.
Program of individual sessions
1. The Early Modern State (22 February, 1 March)
2. “Austria: the Habsburg Heartland” (8 March)
3. “Bohemia: Limited Acceptance” (15 March)
4. “Hungary: Limited Rejection” (22 March)
5. “The German Empire: Limited Hegemony” (29 March)
6. The Role of Wars in State Formation (12 April)
7. Charles VI. (II/III) – War of the Spanish Succession and his Rule in Austria, Bohemia and Hungary (19 April)
8. “Financial Pressure and Reform” during the reign of Maria Theresa 1740-1780 (26 April)
9. Joseph II. – Josephism, Enlightened Absolutism (3 May)
10. The Enlightenment pursuit of improvement through government (10 May)
11. Enlightenment and improvement: continental and regional perspectives (17 May)
12. From the Realms of the Habsburgs to the Austrian Empire
“Locomotive en grève” – une du journal satirique “Kakas Márton”, 24 avril 1904.
A seminar hosted by CEFRES young researcher Mátyás Erdélyi
Time & Venue: Tuesday 15:30-16:50, FHS UK Jinonice, building A, room 2083 Lecturer: Mátyás Erdélyi – CEU / CEFRES Language: English Contact: matyas.erdelyi@cefres.cz
Outline
The aim of the course is to familiarize students with the main topics and problem areas in the history of Central Europe in the long nineteenth century. The course follows a topical arrangement focusing on central themes at the intersection of social history and historical sociology; it is neither chronological, nor comprehensive. Each section starts with the presentation of basic theoretical concepts, followed by the discussion of selected readings. The course focuses on problem areas in connection with the social and economic changes that took place in Central Europe during the long nineteenth century. The key concept of our discussion is ‘modernization theory’ and the different facets of modernization understood as a process of social and economic change in the period under scrutiny. Here, instead of interpreting ‘modernization’ as a normative developmental model, the course demonstrates how modernization could be analyzed as a heterogeneous and non-linear process, which always infers the possibility of fallbacks, as the history of Central Europe demonstrates it, and contains a mixture of ‘traditional’ and ‘modern’ elements.
Program of individual sessions
1 – Conceptual framework; Historical sociology vs. social history; the historical geography of Central-Europe in the 19th century
2 – Modernization, economic backwardness and belated embourgeoisement in Central Europe
3 – Industrialization and urbanization (2 sessions)
4 – Embourgeoisement and the middle-class question
5 – The dynamics of educational expansion (2 sessions)
6 – Professionalization
7 – Jewry: agents of modernization (2 sessions)
8 – Nations, empire, and nationalism at the challenges of modernization (2 sessions)
A seminar hosted by CEFRES young researcher Filip Herza
Time & Venue: every Monday 5-6:20 pm, FHS UK Jinonice building, room 2066 Lecturer: Mgr. Filip Herza – Charles University (FHS / CEFRES)
Prague Language: English Contact: filip.herza@cefres.cz
Outline
The seminar focuses on cities of the fin-de-siécle Austro-Hungarian empire from the perspective of the recent urban history. In the first part of the course, we will study the process of industrialization and the emergence of the metropolitan culture in different capitals and regional centers of the Habsburg monarchy, from the capitals of Vienna and Budapest, to local urban centres such as Prague and Cracow. In the second part of the seminar, we will concentrate on particular aspects of the metropolitan culture and everyday life in the cities. Specifically we will study the production of urban spaces through different social and symbolical practices related to the social stratification of the Austro-Hungarian society, to the contemporary national movements and to the emergence of an international cosmopolitan culture in Europe. The seminar is offered for those interested in the urban history and in the history of the Central and Eastern Europe alike.
Program of individual sessions
20. 2. Introduction: Cities and urban culture in the Austro-Hungarian empire
27.2. Industrialization: Vienna and Budapest
6. 3. Architecture and city planing: Die Ringstraße and Vienna
13. 3. City planing, hygiene and nationalism in Prague
20. 3. Urban festivities and nationalism in Prague
27. 3. Urban experiences (in Budapest)
3. 4. Popular press and metropolitan identity (in Cracow)
10. 4. Science in/and the City (of Vienna)
17. 4. Moving between cities – technology and transportation (Bratislava/Pressburg/Poszóny)
24. 4. Cities in war (Vienna)
15. 5. Essay writing and final discussion
French Research Center in Humanities and Social Sciences – Prague
