Jewish responses to persecution, 1933-1946 – VIRTUAL SEMINAR

A lecture by Emil Kerenji (Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies; United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington), in the frame of the seminar on Modern Jewish History organized by the Masaryk Institute and Archives of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Charles University, CEFRES and the Prague Center for Jewish Studies.

Due to the new coronavirus travel restrictions, Emil Kerenji is unable to come to Prague as planned. We will offer the presentation by Emil Kerenji as a virtual seminar, taking place over the Internet with the help of a videoconferencing software. It will, however, only take place if enough of you express your interest. Please email Daniela Bartáková at bartakova@mua.cas.cz by March 20.

When: 26 March 2020, from 3 pm – VIRTUAL SEMINAR
Language: English

Abstract

This lecture will discuss the long-term project at the Mandel Center at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, to document Jewish perceptions of, and responses to, the series of events between 1933 and 1946 that today we understand as one unified event, the Holocaust. What were the forms of Jewish persecution as it extended beyond Nazi Germany, and eventually descended into genocide? How were they perceived on the ground, and how did geographical, political, cultural, economic, and class circumstances effect these perceptions? What were the options available to Jewish individuals, groups, institutions, and organizations in extremis, and what were some of the typical reactions? Finally, how does this history and understanding of the Jewish experience influence our understanding of the Holocaust? The lecture will also introduce a digital resource that grew out of this project, Experiencing History

Jewish pioneer youth in interwar Czechoslovakia – crafting the chosen body – ONLINE

A lecture by Daniela Bartáková (Masaryk Institute and Archives of the Czech Academy of Science), in the frame of the seminar on Modern Jewish History organized by the Masaryk Institute and Archives of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Charles University, CEFRES and the Prague Center for Jewish Studies.

Where: The session will be conducted over a videoconferencing platform. Registration: bartakova@mua.cas.cz
When: Wednesday 19 May 2020, from 5:30 pm to 7 pm

Language: English

Abstract

Jewish pioneer youth movements played a crucial role in the practical realization of socialist Zionism. Their activities focused on the achievement of social, national, political, and cultural goals, and last but not least, members of these movements were actively involved in the concept of building the new chosen body on the individual and collective level.
The talk will focus on the discursive understanding of the Zionist movement, its dynamic processes, and practices of social and national community shaping, which utilized the methods of bio-power on the level of individuals as well as the whole nation. Both anatomo-politics and biopolitics have become part of Zionist discursive practices. Through the adoption of these practices, Jewish pioneers contributed actively to the formation of the founding myths of the Zionist movement and the negation of the diaspora allegedly discredited through effeminacy and degeneration. Thus, they helped to reproduce the myth of returning to Palestine as the only possible way of regenerating the Jewish nation, its “normalization” and returning to history. Members of pioneer youth movements promoted a synthesis between socialism and nationalism in Palestine, which was to provide an alternative to the passive bourgeois, orthodox life of the paternal generation. The idea of equality has become one of the mobilizing motives for joining both movements. The “red assimilation” became a competitor to the Zionist movement and an alternative for pioneer Jewish youth.

Ivan Blatný, Langston Hughes: Translation, Transnationality, and the Blues

What were the intertextual relationships between the African American poet Langston Hughes and the Czech poet Ivan Blatný? How did Blatný employ English in his poetry, how did Hughes use references to Czechoslovakia? How do poets and poems move across languages and power blocs and what were other literary relationships between the Czech lands and the African American cultural community? And what roles does translation play here? These are some of the questions we will be discussing with Julie Hansen, Charles Sabatos, and Justin Quinn. The discussion, co-organized by the Institute of Czech Literature and CEFRES, will take place in English (or rather, it will move between English and Czech) and will be moderated by Františka Schormová. Continue reading Ivan Blatný, Langston Hughes: Translation, Transnationality, and the Blues →

Is ‘Hard Science’ a Limit to the Concept of ‘Field’?

The eighth session of IMS / CEFRES epistemological seminar of this year will be hosted by

Julien Wacquez (CEFRES / EHESS)
Is ‘Hard Science’ a Limit to the Concept of ‘Field’?

Where: CEFRES Library – Na Florenci 3, Prague 1
When: Wednesday 17 April 2019 from 4:30 pm to 6 pm
Language: English

Text:

Bourdieu, Pierre & Wacquant, Loïc (1992), “The Logic of Fields,” in An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology, Pierre Bourdieu & Loïc Wacquant, The University of Chicago Press, 1992, pp. 94-115
Materials on Larry Niven’s Ringworld (1970) novel, by Julien Wacquez

Is Animal Violence characteristic in the Middle Ages? On the Adulterous Stork.

Thursday, May 14^th starting at 9:10 at the CEFRES

Jacques Berlioz (CNRS / EHESS, Paris)

Will hold two conferences:

Is Animal Violence characteristic in the Middle Ages? On the Adulterous Stork.

And

Forces of Nature and Human Reactions: how to deal with the consequences of Natural Catastrophes in the Middle Ages?

As part of the French-Czech workshop for historical sciences that CEFRES organized in collaboration with Charles University’s Faculty of Arts in Prague.

Is Academic Freedom a Freedom of All?

CEFRES 30th Anniversary International Conference (Part 2), Prague, 25–26 November 2021

Venue: Prague, Carolinum, Ovocný trh 3, and online on CEFRES Facebook page and on Zoom
Date: 25–26 November 2021

Academic freedom is weakened and even challenged in many countries by various political, economic and religious powers. The indifference of the population for a freedom often perceived as a caste privilege aggravates this situation. It is therefore urgent to make academic freedom a public good that concerns all members of a society.

After a first part held last May, CEFRES is organising the second part of its 30th anniversary international conference on 25–26 November 2021 in Prague, together with its CEFRES Platform partners, Charles University and the Czech Academy of Sciences. The conference will be held at the Carolinum of Charles University and simultaneously online.

Download the presentation of the participants here!

Program

Thursday, 25 November 2021

4:30–6:30 pm (English)
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85931944473

Welcome speeches

Lenka Rovná, Vice-Rector of Charles University
Alexis Dutertre, Ambassador of France in Czech Republic (to be confirmed)
Ondřej Beránek, Vice-President of the Czech Academy of Sciences, responsible for Humanities and Social Sciences
Jérôme Heurtaux, Director of CEFRES

Film Screening: Science in Exile, by Pierre-Jérôme Adjedj and Pascale Laborier, 2020 (8’).

Round-Table: Is academic freedom a freedom of all?

Moderator: Pascale Laborier, Professor at University of Nanterre, Vice-President of Paris-Lumières University

Jiří Přibáň, Professor at Cardiff University
Pierre-Jérôme Adjedj, Photographer and Video Artist
Dilnur Reyhan, President of European Uyghur Institute
Olga Golubko, Emergency Program Manager at the Education Office for the New Belarus
Michal Vašečka, Program Director of Bratislava Policy Institute

Cocktail

Friday 26 November 2021

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81879262389

Scholars and institutions facing powers

9:30–11:15 (English)

Moderator: Alena Marková, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Humanities, Charles University

Gábor Egry, Director of the Institute of Political History, Budapest The silence of the lambs? Cooptation, exclusion, rewarding: Means of creating a silenced academia in Hungary
Piotr Forecki, Professor at Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznań
History on trial. The attack on Holocaust researchers in Poland
Shamil Jeppie, Associate Professor at University of Cape Town Freedom and ethics in the academy
Cherine Hussein, Senior Researcher at the Institute of International Relations, Prague Resistance Movements, Scholar-Activism and the Question of Solidarity

Coffee Break

Does New Public Management challenge scientific freedom?

11:30–13:00 (English)

Moderator: Mitchell Young, Assistant Professor, Institute of International Relations, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University

Tereza Stöckelová, Researcher at the Institute of sociology of Czech Academy of Sciences
Why academic freedom must be challenged
Michael Komm, Michaela Vojtková et Lukáš Dvořáček, Věda žije!
When scientists are not playing fair and how to deal with it
Frédéric Sawicki, Professor of political science, Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University The perverse effects of the managerial turn: The French experience

Lunch

How to defend and protect academic freedom?

14:15–16:00 (French and English, with live translation)

Moderator: Jakob Vogel, Director of Marc Bloch Center, Berlin

Catherine Gousseff, Senior researcher at CNRS The exceptional welcome of the Russian academic exile in Prague (1920–1939): State policy and benefits of experiences
Pascale Laborier, Vice-President of Paris-Lumières University, Co-Founder of PAUSE Some lessons on hosting researchers in exile abroad
Habib Mellakh, President of the Association tunisienne de défense des valeurs universitaires (ATDVU) Challenging and defending academic freedom: The Tunisian experience
Béatrice Hibou, Senior researcher at CNRS – CERI-Sciences Po, Paris
Some lessons from the support to Fariba Adelkhah, scientific prisoner in Iran

Coffee Break

What to do? How to do?

16:30–18:00 (French and English, with live translation)

Moderator: Jérôme Heurtaux, Director of CEFRES

All Participants and, among others, Katia Boissevain, Director of IRMC (Tunis), Pierre Buhler, CAPS-MEAE, Adrien Delmas, Director of the Jacques Berque Center (Rabat), Adrien Fauve, Director of IFEAC (Bichkek), Anaïs Marin, Researcher at CCFEF, Warsaw and Special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Belarus, etc.

Download the presentation of the participants here!