Urban history in our field has taken many different forms in the past few decades. Many such work... more Urban history in our field has taken many different forms in the past few decades. Many such works, no doubt, have drawn great inspiration from scholars outside our area specialization. Many, however, have looked within our area specialization for inspiration, thus giving urban histories of our region several peculiar characteristics. The first part of this article discusses how urban historians have provided new perspectives on a topic long dear to Eastern Europeanist hearts—nationalism. Here the article looks at the ways in which Gary Cohen’s Politics of Ethnic Survival has influenced how historians have studied nationalism and the city. The second part will briefly survey other forms of urban history that have predominated within the field, many of which recall the questions and approaches first found in Carl Schorske’s Fin-de-siècle Vienna. The final part concludes with some thoughts about what the rise of urban history among Eastern Europeanists might mean for the future our field.
“Socialist Lord’s Prayer” (72), lived on in messianic sects amongst the peasantry and continued t... more “Socialist Lord’s Prayer” (72), lived on in messianic sects amongst the peasantry and continued to haunt successive Hungarian governments until World War II. There was never another successful anarchist movement in Hungary after the agrarian anarchists were crushed, in part because of intellectuals’ unwillingness or inability to touch the emotions of the populace. Those who tried include Count Ervin Batthyány, whose views so shocked his family that they shut him up in an insane asylum for two years (1902–1903). The count was incorrigible and subsequently spent his time trying to enlighten peasants and struggling with official harassment. It was a lonely fight. The National Anarchist Congress held in Budapest in 1909 attracted just 26 delegates, of whom all but five were from the city. The sole foreign delegate, a Serb named Sava Popović, was deported. In 1910, Batthyány gave up and immigrated to England. Batthyány was followed by a mixed bag of anarchists, and it is with them that the book’s narrative, like anarchism, breaks down. There is little description of anarchist positions during World War I, nothing on collapse and revolution in 1918, only a brief mention of the Béla Kun period, and nothing on Trianon. Scarcely six pages treat anarchist influences in 1919–1946, followed by a leap to the end of the Communist period. Surely Communist authorities struggled with anarchists at the start of their rule? With all these faults, there are occasional flashes of clarity, such as the vivid section on police abuse of anarchist journalists in 1991 (200). In other ways, the text is rough. It seems to have gone without copy editing. The prose is turgid and requires expert knowledge of Hungarian history and culture. Symptomatically, the word viharsarok (literally “storm-corner” [71]) is not translated. The English reader will miss associations here (as elsewhere): the agrarian socialist Géza Féja, who took inspiration from Várkonyi, was sentenced to prison in 1937 for publishing a book called Viharsarok about peasant messianism in an area that had seen numerous uprisings over the centuries. But the reader would never know. Only a few dozen pages seem to have been added to the original Hungarian version, published in 1994. The discussion of Oszkár Jászi and István Bibό reads like an afterthought. The book ends with musings about anarchism’s failures and outdated predictions about its future. It is a shame that the authors did not take better advantage of the chance to revise the text when it was translated. We can only hope they will return to this work that started, also like anarchism, with such promise, for huge gaps in the historical narrative need filling. This then is a starting point, not an ending one. Flawed though this book is, there is still no better depiction in English of its wraithlike subject.
This chapter examines promenading and strolling among Prague’s middling classes in the early deca... more This chapter examines promenading and strolling among Prague’s middling classes in the early decades of the nineteenth century. Using topographies, guidebooks and lithographs, Bryant argues that walking challenged long-established ideas that nobles, the clergy and burghers should enjoy privileges denied to the general population. Promenading signalled the end of the old order and the emergence of a city increasingly dominated by a new class of civil servants, traders, intelligentsia and industrialists who embraced liberal ideas. Second, walking atop or beyond the walls challenged notions of Prague as a closed city whose residents lived within a self-contained, clearly-demarcated world. Standing atop the city’s surrounding hills, emerging elites imagined Prague as an urban space in harmony with its natural surroundings.
This chapter examines promenading and strolling among Prague’s middling classes in the early deca... more This chapter examines promenading and strolling among Prague’s middling classes in the early decades of the nineteenth century. Using topographies, guidebooks and lithographs, Bryant argues that walking challenged long-established ideas that nobles, the clergy and burghers should enjoy privileges denied to the general population. Promenading signalled the end of the old order and the emergence of a city increasingly dominated by a new class of civil servants, traders, intelligentsia and industrialists who embraced liberal ideas. Second, walking atop or beyond the walls challenged notions of Prague as a closed city whose residents lived within a self-contained, clearly-demarcated world. Standing atop the city’s surrounding hills, emerging elites imagined Prague as an urban space in harmony with its natural surroundings.
ABSTRACT:Karel Vladislav Zap, who came of age during the 1830 revolutions in Europe, belonged to ... more ABSTRACT:Karel Vladislav Zap, who came of age during the 1830 revolutions in Europe, belonged to a generation of Czech elites determined to promote national consciousness while actively carving out a space within Prague's middle-class social milieu. Zap, as his topographies of the city demonstrate, also called on his countrymen to claim the city and its structures from their German-speaking neighbours, thus contributing to a dynamic that would continue throughout the century.
In this article Chad Bryant examines how Nazi and postwar Czechoslovak officials defined and ascr... more In this article Chad Bryant examines how Nazi and postwar Czechoslovak officials defined and ascribed nationality in the Bohemian crownlands. Specifically, Bryant looks at how officials struggled to come to terms with so-called amphibians—people who could switch public nationality or whose nationality was unclear. Amphibians challenged officials to define what they meant by “Czech” or “German.” Although the definitions of what made a Czech or a German became increasingly absurd, confused, and contradictory from 1939 to 1946, officials continued to mark individuals as either Czechs or Germans, thus eliminating “amphibianism.” The state had now assumed the sole authority over the ascription of nationality in die Bohemian crownlands. The individual’s right to choose a public nationality—a fundamental aspect of prewar civil society—had been stripped away. The article ends with a glance at other European cases, and a suggestion for future studies of nationality politics in Europe during ...
Urban history in our field has taken many different forms in the past few decades. Many such work... more Urban history in our field has taken many different forms in the past few decades. Many such works, no doubt, have drawn great inspiration from scholars outside our area specialization. Many, however, have looked within our area specialization for inspiration, thus giving urban histories of our region several peculiar characteristics. The first part of this article discusses how urban historians have provided new perspectives on a topic long dear to Eastern Europeanist hearts—nationalism. Here the article looks at the ways in which Gary Cohen’s Politics of Ethnic Survival has influenced how historians have studied nationalism and the city. The second part will briefly survey other forms of urban history that have predominated within the field, many of which recall the questions and approaches first found in Carl Schorske’s Fin-de-siècle Vienna. The final part concludes with some thoughts about what the rise of urban history among Eastern Europeanists might mean for the future our field.
“Socialist Lord’s Prayer” (72), lived on in messianic sects amongst the peasantry and continued t... more “Socialist Lord’s Prayer” (72), lived on in messianic sects amongst the peasantry and continued to haunt successive Hungarian governments until World War II. There was never another successful anarchist movement in Hungary after the agrarian anarchists were crushed, in part because of intellectuals’ unwillingness or inability to touch the emotions of the populace. Those who tried include Count Ervin Batthyány, whose views so shocked his family that they shut him up in an insane asylum for two years (1902–1903). The count was incorrigible and subsequently spent his time trying to enlighten peasants and struggling with official harassment. It was a lonely fight. The National Anarchist Congress held in Budapest in 1909 attracted just 26 delegates, of whom all but five were from the city. The sole foreign delegate, a Serb named Sava Popović, was deported. In 1910, Batthyány gave up and immigrated to England. Batthyány was followed by a mixed bag of anarchists, and it is with them that the book’s narrative, like anarchism, breaks down. There is little description of anarchist positions during World War I, nothing on collapse and revolution in 1918, only a brief mention of the Béla Kun period, and nothing on Trianon. Scarcely six pages treat anarchist influences in 1919–1946, followed by a leap to the end of the Communist period. Surely Communist authorities struggled with anarchists at the start of their rule? With all these faults, there are occasional flashes of clarity, such as the vivid section on police abuse of anarchist journalists in 1991 (200). In other ways, the text is rough. It seems to have gone without copy editing. The prose is turgid and requires expert knowledge of Hungarian history and culture. Symptomatically, the word viharsarok (literally “storm-corner” [71]) is not translated. The English reader will miss associations here (as elsewhere): the agrarian socialist Géza Féja, who took inspiration from Várkonyi, was sentenced to prison in 1937 for publishing a book called Viharsarok about peasant messianism in an area that had seen numerous uprisings over the centuries. But the reader would never know. Only a few dozen pages seem to have been added to the original Hungarian version, published in 1994. The discussion of Oszkár Jászi and István Bibό reads like an afterthought. The book ends with musings about anarchism’s failures and outdated predictions about its future. It is a shame that the authors did not take better advantage of the chance to revise the text when it was translated. We can only hope they will return to this work that started, also like anarchism, with such promise, for huge gaps in the historical narrative need filling. This then is a starting point, not an ending one. Flawed though this book is, there is still no better depiction in English of its wraithlike subject.
This chapter examines promenading and strolling among Prague’s middling classes in the early deca... more This chapter examines promenading and strolling among Prague’s middling classes in the early decades of the nineteenth century. Using topographies, guidebooks and lithographs, Bryant argues that walking challenged long-established ideas that nobles, the clergy and burghers should enjoy privileges denied to the general population. Promenading signalled the end of the old order and the emergence of a city increasingly dominated by a new class of civil servants, traders, intelligentsia and industrialists who embraced liberal ideas. Second, walking atop or beyond the walls challenged notions of Prague as a closed city whose residents lived within a self-contained, clearly-demarcated world. Standing atop the city’s surrounding hills, emerging elites imagined Prague as an urban space in harmony with its natural surroundings.
This chapter examines promenading and strolling among Prague’s middling classes in the early deca... more This chapter examines promenading and strolling among Prague’s middling classes in the early decades of the nineteenth century. Using topographies, guidebooks and lithographs, Bryant argues that walking challenged long-established ideas that nobles, the clergy and burghers should enjoy privileges denied to the general population. Promenading signalled the end of the old order and the emergence of a city increasingly dominated by a new class of civil servants, traders, intelligentsia and industrialists who embraced liberal ideas. Second, walking atop or beyond the walls challenged notions of Prague as a closed city whose residents lived within a self-contained, clearly-demarcated world. Standing atop the city’s surrounding hills, emerging elites imagined Prague as an urban space in harmony with its natural surroundings.
ABSTRACT:Karel Vladislav Zap, who came of age during the 1830 revolutions in Europe, belonged to ... more ABSTRACT:Karel Vladislav Zap, who came of age during the 1830 revolutions in Europe, belonged to a generation of Czech elites determined to promote national consciousness while actively carving out a space within Prague's middle-class social milieu. Zap, as his topographies of the city demonstrate, also called on his countrymen to claim the city and its structures from their German-speaking neighbours, thus contributing to a dynamic that would continue throughout the century.
In this article Chad Bryant examines how Nazi and postwar Czechoslovak officials defined and ascr... more In this article Chad Bryant examines how Nazi and postwar Czechoslovak officials defined and ascribed nationality in the Bohemian crownlands. Specifically, Bryant looks at how officials struggled to come to terms with so-called amphibians—people who could switch public nationality or whose nationality was unclear. Amphibians challenged officials to define what they meant by “Czech” or “German.” Although the definitions of what made a Czech or a German became increasingly absurd, confused, and contradictory from 1939 to 1946, officials continued to mark individuals as either Czechs or Germans, thus eliminating “amphibianism.” The state had now assumed the sole authority over the ascription of nationality in die Bohemian crownlands. The individual’s right to choose a public nationality—a fundamental aspect of prewar civil society—had been stripped away. The article ends with a glance at other European cases, and a suggestion for future studies of nationality politics in Europe during ...
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