Search

Funda considers Masaryk's philosophy of the meaning of Czech history from the position of Popper's later critique of all historicism and messianism, be it the Abrahamic messianism of God's chosen people, the culmination of history in Christian eschatology, or the secularised fiction of history's happy ending touted mainly by totalitarian regimes. Although Funda himself admits that one may speak of a certain intended direction of short historical periods, he understands history and human life as a movement, a process of events: they are a complexity of complementary components in correlation, continuity, and context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper systematically maps and analyses the opinions of the Czech public on the Velvet Revolution and the social situation in the periods before and after the revolution. It first focuses attention on the image of the Velvet Revolution within the context of Czech modern history, and it explores the opinions of the public on this event. It takes a special look at how the Czech public evaluates the periods before and after 1989 and their perceptions of the entire period since 1989. The Velvet Revolution and related events are viewed mostly as a positive period in Czech history, as a period of rise. The ensuing period is viewed in a similarly positive light, but not as positive as the actual act of changing the political regime. However, a significant difference was found between the Czech public's evaluation of the first and second decades after the Velvet Revolution. In the public's view, not every area of life has improved during this period and some areas are even evaluated as worse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Coasts of Bohemia: A Czech History. By Derek Sayer. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998. Pp. 442. $29.95. Derek Sayer of the University of Alberta has fulfilled an admirable and [...]

The Coasts of Bohemia: A Czech History, by Derek Sayer. Princeton, New Jersey, Princeton University Press, 1998. xv, 442 pp. $29.95. This book owes its title to William Shakespeare who, [...]

Professional didactic research in the field of history has been developing in the Czech Republic since the mid-1990s, mainly at the Department of History of the Faculty of Arts of the University of Ostrava. This study deals with the concept of empirical research on historical consciousness and the current state of teaching history in the Czech Republic implemented in 2011. Mixed qualitative and quantitative research methods were performed (focus groups, questionnaire surveys, in-depth interviews) in a group of 2,524 respondents (students of primary schools, secondary vocational schools, secondary grammar schools, history education students and history teachers themselves) from nine regions in the Czech Republic. The paper describes theoretical and methodological bases, and presents partial results of the research concerning selected aspects of the relationship of students and teachers towards history and specifically towards the history of the Czech lands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explains the development and specific features of the detective genre in the Czech Republic (and its predecessor Czechoslovakia) from the beginning of the 20th century. It observes that these features are just as valid in the last 30 years. The main focus is on crime fiction literature and, in particular, TV crime series that have become especially popular since 2015, both of which have been inspired by true organised crime cases between 1990-2010.

The article is focused on fire protection systems in the now historic Ilyushin Il-28, the only aircraft in the history of Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic designed solely as a bomber and equipped with jet engines. The article presents statistics of air accidents of this type of aircraft and their causes, emergency procedures for on-board fires and a description of the fire-fighting and inert gas systems. Due to difficulties in accessing the now scarce resources related to historical information of technical nature on the subject, the contents of the following paragraphs can be considered unique. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author considers several texts that have recently been devoted to Masaryk’s book Česká otázka (The Czech Question), but the topic of the article revolves around the more general issue of “the Czech question,” and not the book itself. The intention is to find out what the contemporary forms and pathways are of the intellectual self-reflection on Czech national existence. On the one hand, there is a collection of philosophers and other experts in the humanities who are trying to determine the extent to which Masaryk’s book, dating from the end of the 19th century, is still important for the current state of the Czech nation (and thus “Czech questions”). On the other hand, another focus of the article is a set of twenty reflections on the current state of, and the degree of threat to, the nation’s uniqueness, written by a prominent Czech neurologist who also takes into account the more than century-long debate on the “meaning of Czech history.” Although a comparison of both approaches reveals some similarities in their awareness of a crisis in the current state of the Czech nation, significant differences in methodological starting points soon step into the foreground and from this emerge differences in the conclusions the different approaches reach, differences that touch on the future toward which the nation is maturing.

The article analyses the style of two picture series dealing with Czech history. The analysis focuses primarily on the way of mediating historical knowledge as well as forming and establishing cultural memory in the two series which are compared. In connection with this, the use of language, the construction of meanings and the interplay between verbal and visual components are described. The picture series investigated represent opposing approaches to the issue of cultural (historical) memory. The objective of Obrázky z českých dějin a pověstí (Pictures from Czech History and Legends; 1980, revised edition 1996) is to depict a traditional version of Czech history and support its adoption by recipients (children being the main target group). Obrázky include various informal, derogatory and anachronistic elements, but these components are used purposefully to attract the interest of recipients in a didactic presentation of historical events. On the other hand, Opráski sčeskí historje (perhaps: Pictures from Czech History; 2014–2015) submit an alternative, subversive, comical and absurd version of Czech history. Their objective is to destruct the traditional view of such history. In order to achieve this effect, Opráskitake advantage of intentional orthographical mistakes (with great invention), play with the language, polysemy of words, anachronisms and intertextual relations to contemporary popular culture.

Jaroslav Goll’s school, a noticeable phenomenon of the Czech historiography, was discussed. This school arose from J. Goll’s historical seminar at the Czech Faculty of Philosophy in Prague in the late 19th century. J. Goll’s students, the first generation of Czech professional historians, defined the Czech historical science development during the subsequent 50 years. The phenomenon of J. Goll’s school was for the first time analyzed based on the approaches of the contemporary Russian historiography. The anthropological and social aspects of J. Goll’s school were considered. Some facts of J. Goll’s biography were also mentioned. It was concluded that J. Goll’s school was a strong and leading scientific and pedagogical school. It had the basic elements of a scientific school as a social group. A great variety of research themes and methodological approaches within the school was determined by the wide range of problems covered by its research program. The revision of F. Palacký’s concept of Czech history initiated by J. Goll required multilateralism within the school. J. Goll did his best to preserve the school unity up to the World War I.

The web map portal Czech Historical Atlas presents a digital output of a synthesis of two printed historical atlases published within the long-term cooperation of a team of cartographers from the Department of Geomatics, CTU in Prague and a team of historians from the Institute of History of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic. The topics and chapters from these two atlases were carefully selected and combined to effectively present historical topics dealing mainly with the geographical area of the Czech lands. The map content is depicted via the most modern cartographic methods employing the advanced functionality of the web environment. The structure of the map portal has been designed considering user friendliness with an emphasis on simple and intuitive control. Therefore, it is easily accessible to the general public of all ages. The content of the portal is divided into eight chapters - Borders and Territories, Borders and Regions, the Czech State and Europe in the 20th Century, Populations, Religion and Faith, Historical Milestones, Periods and Consequences, War Conflicts and Their Consequences, and Landscape and Humans. Each of the chapters is then further divided into several subchapters which represent separate web map applications presenting a set of temporally or thematically related maps (see Fig. 1). Map applications are supplemented by accompanying texts with a list of basic literature, which briefly describes the certain thematic subchapter or the particular maps. Moreover, a number of illustrations from public and private collections is provided. These illustrations (e.g. old maps, historical and present photographs) significantly supplement the thematic content of the map and enrich the perception of historical processes illustrated through the cartographic representation. The map portal is not just a common web site referring to individual map applications or topics. It is complemented by a number of texts on the issues of historical cartography as a scientific field and it refers to other works of historical cartography, both printed and digital. The web map portal, as well as individual map applications, is based on ESRI platform using standard web technologies HTML, CSS, JavaScript and PHP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article questions real theological character of some streams of the older Czech moral theological thought which ended in 1948 (beginning of the communist regime) and after 1989 has never been quoted or mentioned. It was a rationalistic neo-scholastic period of abstract philosophical theology The blind alleys of theology can be traced in such areas as: the Scripture and philosophical speculation; “good” deed being good only as resulting in one’s eternal happiness; personal spiritual life and universally binding moral norms; moral norms and the church and state law; natural ethics; dependence of theology on the political situation; universal validity and particular character of catholic moral theology; moral and religious norms of acting; moral responsibility to one’s conscience and ethical responsibility to a heteronomous authority. As examples of a really theological moral theology the work of Thomas Aquinas and Franz Bockle are presented. Their rationally constructed theology may be opposed by legal or disciplinary measures, religious manipulation, direct arguing by the will of God, or blind obedience. Nevertheless, personal moral responsibility remains undisputed. It is necessary to free oneself from some thought patterns and false traditions to uphold responsibility to the tradition of faith and real theology.