The large compendium titled Die österreichisch-ungarische Monarchie in Wort und Bild contains two volumes devoted to Bohemia (1894 and 1896) and one volume devoted to Moravia and Silesia (1897). Chapters on folk culture are accompanied by a plethora of pictures, a significant number of which depict rural residents wearing traditional dress. However, the informative value of illustrations depicting folk costumes from Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia as a source for ethnological research is limited. The unbalanced selection of examples from individual regions is problematic. Understandably, a great emphasis was placed on the German ethnic group, but even ethnographic regions inhabited by Czech population are not represented proportionally to the preservation of traditional culture, so the resulting visual perception does not even correspond to the reality in the late nineteenth century. Czech painters were addressed to illustrate two volumes about Bohemia, but the Moravia and Silesia volume was illustrated almost exclusively by artists with ties to the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts, where they studied or taught, and to the imperial court. However, not only Viennese, but even all Czech painters had no direct experience with the folk culture in Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia. They worked according to supplied photographs, the availability of which eventually influenced the choice of illustrations. The successful level of both the drawing and painting templates and their xylographic treatments posed a positive aspect. And what is essential - the comparison with the traced model photographs confirms their basically faithful interpretation. Even so, the ethnologist cannot underestimate the critical insight into the documentary value of the illustrations accompanying the admirably monumental work Die österreichisch-ungarische Monarchie in Wort und Bild, named Kronprinzenwerk after its initiator and partly co-author, Crown Prince Rudolf.
Despite the growing number of statistical analyses of life-history data and a long tradition of biographical research, there is often no communication between these two streams of life-course research. It is possible to examine the life course quantitatively through life histories, which may be used to model synthetic biographies in order to reveal patterns in the timing and sequencing of life events, the durations of states between them, and the causal links between them. It is also possible to examine the life course qualitatively through life stories, e.g. biographical narratives, which reflect how persons understand, experience and attach meaning to events and states in their life. Through a quantitative analysis of life-history data we can describe and explain the morphology of particular events in the observed population, while a qualitative analysis of biographical narratives provides insight into people’s decision-making, perceptions of their options, and how they attach meanings to and experience events. This article summarizes the strengths and weaknesses of both approaches, explains in which sense they are connected or differentiated from each other, what data and analyses each perspective may utilize, and briefly introduces one type of mixed methods life course research that utilizes the complementarity of both approaches., Hana Hašková a Radka Dudová., and Obsahuje bibliografii
The Treaty on Friendship, Mutual Assistance and Postwar Cooperation between the Czechoslovak Republic and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics signed on 12 December 1943 in Moscow had a fundamental impact on the orientation of Czechoslovak foreign policy at the end of the war and in the years that followed. At the same time, the lengthy negotiations in 1943, which ultimately resulted in signing the treaty in question, were one of the few moments during the war when Czechoslovakia became the object of an opinion clash between the Great Powers. In this study, which is based primarily on British and US documents (some of which have not been used before), the author analyses in detail the role of the Czechoslovak-Soviet treaty project in the policies of the two Western powers until the signing of the document, before assessing the impact of the treaty in concern on Czechoslovakia’s relations with the United Kingdom and the United States at the end of the war. He points out that neither the British nor the Americans were prepared to conclude a similar treaty with Czechoslovakia since both Western powers wanted the international security system to be based on foundations different from those which had repeatedly failed during the previous three decades. However, the signing of the Czechoslovak-Soviet Treaty dramatically reduced any chance for a federative or confederative arrangement in the region of Central Europe, as well as hopes for a multilateral treaty of alliance ensuring security in this region. For this reason, it was accepted without enthusiasm both in London and in Washington.
Contrary to proponents’ claims, methodological naturalism is not metaphysically neutral. Consequently, its acceptance as a practice requires justification. Unfortunately for its advocates, attempts to justify it are failures. It cannot be defended as a definition, or a self-imposed limitation, of science, nor, more modestly, as an inductively justified commitment to natural causes. As a practice, it functions not to further scientific investigation, but rather to impose an explanatory straitjacket., Na rozdíl od tvrzení zastánců není metodologický naturalismus metafyzicky neutrální. Proto jeho přijetí jako praxe vyžaduje odůvodnění. Bohužel pro své obhájce jsou pokusy ospravedlnit to neúspěchy. Nelze ji obhajovat jako definici nebo samoobmedzení vědy, ani skromněji jako indukčně odůvodněný závazek k přirozeným příčinám. Jako praxe, to funguje ne k dalšímu vědeckému zkoumání, ale poněkud uložit vysvětlující kazajku., and Robert A. Larmer
Transport and communication are phenomena which are based on significant human needs and which play a serious role in human life. The theme was also accepted in the course of research conducted for the needs of the Polish Ethnographic Atlas. Fieldwork made it possible to gather large source materials which were analysed using the ethnographical method. The display of information gained from memories registered on the maps of ethnographic fragments created (re)constructions of the former reality. (Re)constructions that did not take into account the context of common or individual involvement of the users. Such a picture of the past does not make a multi-dimensional view of the phenomena concerned. The application of new interpreting methods offers new knowledge to the researchers.
The article describes and analyses scientific and organizational activities of Otakar Nahodil at the Faculty of Arts, Charles University, within the wider context of Czech ethnography and folkloristics in the 1940-1960s. Based on the study of sources that have never been used for this theme to date and that originate in the management of the Faculty of Arts Charles University, the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and various security forces, it was possible to trace the Nahodil´s way to the position of a probably most influential eminent authority in the ethnological science at that time, as well as his subsequent steep power fall. The study points to a lot of extraordinary problematic features of Nahodil´s research work and personality, which - within specific contexts of that period (ongoing marxization, or stalinization of scientific research and transformation in its themes, cleansing and settling of personal scores at the Faculty of Arts, Charles University, development of
the study of extra-European territories under the monitoring of intelligent services etc.) - strongly influenced the direction of Czech ethnology at that time.
This article affirms the modern origin of sociology as a science and posits a critical posture as its fundamental component. As such, sociology is opposed to any dogmatic conception of knowledge. The critical stance has both internal and external dimension. Sociology is under the obligation to observe a constant vigilance towards the knowledge it produces. A considerable methodological privilege bestowed upon the researchers in sociology requires that they have to be capable of criticizing their conceptual tools and operational procedures. Furthermore, critical attitude consists also in questioning conditioning of results linked to the dependence arising from the subsidizing of research. These preconditions of critical posture are illustrated by consideration of the challenges of researching the so-called “school failure”. Ultimately, responsibility commands a sociologist to respect the principle of precaution. When political action is concerned, the researchers must demand that their rights of intellectual property be preserved. To criticize, in this sense, is not to denounce; nonetheless, sociology will only remain faithful to what can pass legitimately as its essence by demanding the right, against threats and seductions, to speak the truth about social reality. and Claude Javeau.