Call for papers:
Cult of Heroes in Central Europe 1880-1939. Practices and Representations.
Place: Budapest, CEU – Central European University.
Date: 12-13 November, 2010.
Deadline for applications: 15/02/2010.
Organizers: Centre of Interdisciplinary Research on Central Europe (CIRCE,
Paris) – University Paris-Sorbonne, in partnership with the Central European
University (CEU, Budapest) and the Instytut Kultury Polskiej (Institute of
Polish Culture, Warsaw).
Organizers committee: Eszter Balázs – Institute of Political History; Andrea
Petõ – Department of Gender Studies, CEU; Clara Royer – CIRCE.
In numerous European societies heroes started being worshipped among social
groups outside aristocracy and gentry beginning with the last third of the 19th
century. Thanks to recent developments in historiography, various aspects of
the evolution of this ideal have been appraised in France (Venita Datta: Birth
of a National Icon), Germany (Matthew Jefferies: Imperial Culture in Germany,
1871-1918) or Italy (Emilio Gentile: The Struggle for Modernity. Nationalism,
Futurism, and Fascism). However, this new scope of research is still in
progress for Central Europe. Yet, worship of the army and/or sport present in
many societies of the region reflects a heroic ideal, which is echoed by school
programmes, scientific publications for the general public, history textbooks,
media, as well as literary and artistic creations of the time. Worshipping
heroes contributed in reinforcing evolving national identities turned toward and
borne by Central European peoples.
In the frame of the actual project, we would like to gather, from an
interdisciplinary perspective, researchers, who are addressing the issue of the
exaltation of heroic virtues in a national or regional context by different
Central European social groups. The conference aims at unveiling the
evolutions of the practices and symbolic representations of heroic cults in
these cultures and societies that constitute Central Europe from the 1880s to
the eve of World War II. As romanticism was the great period for the
paradigmatic elaboration of heroic figures in most of these countries, we are
interested here not in the genesis of heroes, but rather in how these heroic
figures were re-appropriated, reinterpreted, or opposed to by the emerging
values of modern mass societies at the turn and beginning of the century.
Still, contributions adopting a diachronic perspective from the Vormärz may be
welcome if assessing the evolution of some “traditional” heroic figures (as in
the case of the heroic cult around Pi³sudski in Poland).
However, our hunch is that the First World War and its consequences of
peace have induced many modifications in pre-war practices and
representations (duels for instance). What other practices were preferred by
these various social actors? Papers are welcome that explore how heroic
virtues were linked to the representations of a manhood that has come into
crisis since the end of the century (as was brilliantly demonstrated by George
Mosse, see The Image of Man) or how the various “heroes” represented –
“military” or “civil”, “physical” or “intellectual/moral” – were challenged by new
types of characters rejecting the very values they embodied. This includes
research from gender studies: it is quite well known that women and feminine
values were at least disdained if not rejected around the turn of the century,
but that women came to play new social roles during the war. Therefore, how
did the appraisal of feminine values and figures evolve? Could they challenge
masculine heroes, and if so how? Through papers addressing various cultures
and societies of Central Europe (Polish, Czech, Slovak and Hungarian, including
the cultures of the so-called “nationalities” and “minorities” such as Jewish,
Roma, German, Serbian and so forth), the purpose of this conference is to
point to some variations, dissimilarities and points of encounter between these
diverse cultures.
Panels:
• Vision of the body in new sciences and techniques (physiognomy,
physiology, photography, psychoanalysis…) and heroic social practices (dual,
sport, army) in Central Europe. How does science interfere with the
idealization of the heroic body? Does it convey or does it denounce the
mythologization of modern heroes? How heroism was socially practiced?
• Heroic models and counter-models (Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox;
conservative, democratic, fascist; popular, noble heroes, and so forth). How
was the hero used in a collective nationalist strategy? If minorities elaborated
minority heroes against or possibly accordingly to those of the majority, how
did they do so?
• Women and heroes. Could women become heroes or were they
confined in the role of a negative counterpart? What are the connections
between the belittlement of so-called feminine features and the cult of
heroes? (See for example the influence of Weininger’s theories in Central
Europe, not quite yet appraised.)
• Heroes, anti-heroes and outsiders in literary and media discourses.
How do literary discourses and social practices converge/oppose in
representing heroes? How do new types of heroic protagonists proposed by
Central European literatures question this hero cult?
We particularly encourage applications from Phd candidates, post-doctoral and
early career academics. We will select in priority papers with interdisciplinary
(historical, literary, sociological, aesthetic) or cross-cultural approaches.
Please send a 300 word abstract and a brief CV (5 publications max.) in a
single Word document to:
Clara Royer (CIRCE-Paris Sorbonne) : [log in to unmask]
or Eszter Balázs (Institute of Political History, Budapest) :
[log in to unmask]
Confirmation of receipt will be sent via email within seven days. If you do not
receive an email of confirmation within this time frame, please re-send your
abstract.
We ask that all participants prepare a presentation of no more than 20
minutes to allow for discussion and questions.
There will be no registration fee. Travel and accommodation expenses up to a
limited amount will be covered by the organizers of the conference.
Information regarding accommodation in Budapest will be sent along with
notification of acceptance.
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