The article summarises the position of George Frideric Handel, Joseph Haydn and Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy in the music history of the Bohemian Lands, especially in the 18th and 19th centuries. Haydn became one of the leading figures of Bohemian music life during his life-time. Handel’s sacred compositions were known in Bohemia soon after he settled permanently in England. Handel’s and Haydn’s oratorios belonged to the core repertoire both of the Bohemian 19th century music societies and of private concert organisers; Handel’s music was performed arranged either by Mozart or by the controversial Viennese Kapellmeister and composer Ignaz Franz von Mosel. Mendelssohn was the only composer who matched Handel and Haydn in the number of performances of his oratorios in Bohemia.
The paper aims to demonstrate how the techniques of disciplinary power in prenatal care affect pregnant women. I will illustrate my argument using the results of ethnographic research conducted at the Division of Risk Pregnancy at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology in a hospital in Central Slovakia. The analysis of ethnographic material indicates that although pregnant women are objectified and disciplined in prenatal care, they consider and evaluate the practices of the medical staff. Prenatal care interferes with other social roles which pregnant women play in their life. I interpret the ethnographic material in terms of the concept of disciplinary power developed by Michel Foucault, and in the terms of the theory of moral emotions by Jonathan Haidt. I argue that risk assessment is a part of the techniques of disciplinary power, and that the explicit ascription of feelings of the uncertainty, fear, guilt, and shame to a certain kind of behaviour in pregnancy helps to identify norms that regulate biological reproduction.
This article analyses anti-obesity discourse in post-war Czechoslovakia, particularly in the country’s late socialist period. The article conceives of the discourse on obesity as a tool of biopolitical, rather than totalitarian, power, examining the ways expert knowledge, power, and morality worked together to produce a socialist subject. On the first level, it analyses the expert anti-obesity discourse as an example of the expertisation of public discourse in socialist Czechoslovakia. Second, it shows the construction of obesity in contrast to bodily ability, and the stigmatisation of the ‘fat’ body. On the last level, the article focuses on the gendered aspects of the discourse and demonstrates the ways in which the anti-obesity campaign supported the heteronormative framework of late socialism. By examining expert and media discourses, the article argues that the campaign against obesity served as a means to construct a proper socialist body and induce a moral panic about the state of socialism.
Velká Morava patří ke kontroverzním tématům středoevropské medievistiky. Nejedná se totiž o běžný předmět akademického výzkumu, ale o fenomén, který je trvale přítomen v novodobém politickém diskurzu střední Evropy. Myšlenka, že Velká Morava byla nejstarším státem (státním útvarem) středoevropských Slovanů, na který přímo navazovala státnost českých Přemyslovců, polských Piastovců a uherských Arpádovců, tak zůstává ve středoevropském regionu stále živá. Slabina dosavadních přístupů spočívá v tom, že stát byl chápán jako axiom, o jehož existenci se nepochybuje. Současný proud bádání přistupuje k velkomoravské státnosti mnohem kritičtěji. Obrací se, stejně jako moderní evropská medievistika, k etnologii či sociální a kulturní antropologii, v níž hledá opory pro svoje interpretační modely i nové pojmosloví. and Great Moravia is a controversial theme within Central European Medieval studies. Rather than being a standard subject of academic research it is a phenomenon that has been a constant in Central European modern political discourse. The idea that Great Moravia was the earliest state of Central European Slavs, which was a direct predecessor of the statehood of the Czech Přemyslids, the Polish Piasts and the Hungarian Arpáds family, remains very much alive in the Central European region. The weak point of the earlier approaches consists in the fact that the state was taken to be an axiom, the existence of which was not questioned. The contemporary line of research examines Great Moravian statehood from a more critical point of view. Just as with modern European medieval studies it turns to ethnology as well as social and cultural anthropology, where it hopes to find support for its interpretational models and new terminology.
Leo Kestenberg worked from 1918–1932 for the Prussian Ministerium für Wissenschaft, Kunst und Volksbildung (Ministry of Science, Arts and Public Education). His department looked after opera houses and all music teaching institutions, from nurseries to the Academy of Arts. Implementing the policy of modern thinking, Kestenberg had a decisive influence in shaping the music development of the Weimar Republic, including bringing Paul Hindemith, Franz Schreker, Artur Schnabel and Otto Klemperer to Berlin. Based on his ideas, music education became law; in the field of music education, Prussia became the leading region inside Germany. Kestenberg succeeded due to the post-war situation: besides caring for political and military matters, the political system paid great attention also to culture and especially music. While Kestenberg’s activities at first enjoyed a postive response, even among conservative circles, in the following years, especially after 1933, as a socialist, democrat, Jew and foreigner, he was seen as the epitomy of the hated ‘Weimar System’.