• Abstract and Figures
• Public Full-text

Claire E. Nolte. The Sokol in the Czech Lands to 1914: Training for the Nation. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. 258 pp. $69.95, cloth, ISBN 978-0-333-68298-2. Reviewed by Cynthia Paces Published on HABSBURG (June, 2004) The back cover of Claire Nolte's study of the Nolte is primarily interested in describing Czech Sokol gymnastics organization is a stunning how a group of idealistic, intellectual patriots--as photograph from 1876. A group of middle-aged pictured on the cover--became a mass movement. shirtless men pose together for a photograph of Nolte cites numerous scholars who agree upon the Trainer's Group of the Prague Sokol. The men the Sokol's immense popularity and influence. Yet, have been carefully arranged. Two drape their she laments, there have been "no scholarly stud‐ arms around one another; another lies on the ies of an organization that played such a key role floor; one puts his hand on his hip; and another in the modern history of the Czech nation" (p. 2). leans his elbow on someone's shoulder. Two hold She has now flled in this scholarly gap with a de‐ swords. In the center sits Sokol founder Miroslav tailed study of the Sokol's early history. Tyrs, legs crossed with his arm resting gently on The Sokol was not, of course, the only nine‐ his knee. He looks the intellectual that he was, ex‐ teenth-century patriotic gymnastics organization. cept that he, too, appears in trousers but no shirt. These clubs were prevalent in Europe, in particu‐ What makes the picture even more curious lar in Germany, where Friedrich Ludwig Jahn's are the various gazes of the subjects. No one looks Turnverein had tremendous influence. France, at the camera, and each man stares off in differ‐ too, had popular gymnastics clubs, and indeed ent directions into unknown distances. We do not modern gymnastics stemmed from the Enlighten‐ know what they are thinking about or what un‐ ment campaign to perfect the body as well as the certain future they look toward. Yet Claire Nolte's mind of the new bourgeoisie. careful study of these men's influential patriotic Yet, Nolte's thesis states that the Czech version organization will tell us that their divergent gazes of patriotic gymnastics "was not, as elsewhere in demonstrate that the Sokol would have a variety Europe, a response to a military defeat, rather an of futures. effort to harness the rising national consciousness of the Czech masses to a political purpose" (p. 3). H-Net Reviews Her argument owes much to Miroslav Hroch, the ism will be interested in seeing how an intellectu‐ Czech historian, who posited a model for the al concept of nation became fused with the physi‐ emergence of nationalism in the small nations of cal aspects of social belonging. The book is an in‐ Europe. He broke down the phases of nationalism stitutional and political history, describing the re‐ into three distinct phases: (A) when isolated schol‐ lationship between a voluntary organization and ars frst formulate the ideas of national identity; a developing national movement. (B) when local elites begin to embrace these val‐ Throughout the book, we learn more about ues; and (C) the period of mass politics. As Nolte the bourgeois leadership of the organization than points out, Hroch has primarily written about the vast membership that is brought into the stage B, as have numerous other historians of Bo‐ movement. Nolte does cite George Mosse, but hemia. Nolte wants to understand better the there is potential to incorporate even further his mechanisms of phase C when nationalism be‐ methods of studying the rise of German nation‐ comes more "iconocentric" rather than "lingua‐ alisms. His now-classic Nationalization of the centric," and is accessible to the masses and not Masses taught us how to "read" Central European merely an educated elite (p. 2). festivities, monuments and national insignia. Nolte's book details the Sokol's evolution from Nolte describes Sokol slets (festivals) and some of its founding in 1862 to the eve of war in 1914 and the symbols of the Sokol, but there is room to de‐ examines multiple facets of the Sokol, including velop her analysis of the "iconocentric stage of the class, gender, religious and nationalist ideas. She movement" even further. argues that the organization served as a testing Although gymnastics is at the heart of the ground for various ideas about the nation. In its study, and Nolte describes Sokol sports and exer‐ slogan "Every Czech a Sokol!" the society hoped to cises, her primary concern is not the construction represent the inclusiveness of the small nation. of the body through a nationalist ideology. Again, Indeed, even Tyrs, the founder of the Sokol, adopt‐ George Mosse could serve as a model to inspire ed his Czech identity, having been born as more analysis on how Sokol members conceived Friedrich Emanuel Tirsch in a German-speaking the national body. In Nationalism and Sexuality family and community. Czech women, students he posits the centrality of male homosexual and and workers could also fnd public roles in this in‐ homosocial belonging in the construction of na‐ clusive, progressive movement. Yet the society tional identity.[1] Nolte does show us that the was susceptible to more dangerous--Nolte calls movement became more masculine and militaris‐ them "mature"--nationalisms that developed in tic (and less friendly to its female members) as the the twentieth century. The Sokol had periods of First World War approached. The Sokol's virile anti-Semitism and anti-Catholicism, and became fraternity could be analyzed throughout the study, increasingly militaristic as the Habsburg monar‐ though. One need only to look at the 1876 cover chy headed toward ruin. And ultimately the Sokol photograph to see that male friendship was a cen‐ was a highly masculinized movement, which tral feature of the movement from the outset. revered the developed, strong, and coordinated Bourgeois men--lawyers, politicians, and profes‐ male body. sors--are partially nude, brandish swords, and af‐ The Sokol in the Czech Lands is an extremely fectionately touch one another. One of the most useful book for scholars of the Habsburg monar‐ exciting developments in postcolonial and gender chy and the Bohemian lands, who will enjoy history is the study of masculinity as an organiz‐ Nolte's careful attention to detail and her excel‐ ing principle of political and cultural movements. lent bibliography and notes. Scholars of national‐ Indeed, we scholars of the Habsburg lands could 2 H-Net Reviews raise interesting parallels from recent theoretical [3]. Patrick F. McDevitt, "May the Best Man contributions to the study of nationalism by nu‐ Win": Sport, Masculinity, and Nationalism in merous postcolonial scholars who are grappling Great Britain and the Empire, 1880-1935 (New with the intersection of the idea of the nation and York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004). the physical bodies that actually make up the na‐ [4]. Keith A. Sandiford and Brian Stoddart, tion. eds., Imperial Game: Cricket, Culture and Society Sports itself has been a fruitful area of study (Manchester and New York: Manchester Universi‐ in this burgeoning feld. The recently published ty Press, 1998). "May the Best Man Win", by Patrick F. McDevitt, explores the intersections among sport, gender, and class.[3] As working classes, women, and colonial subjects questioned the power structures in Britain, the male bourgeoisie turned to sport to assert and confirm its strength. Imperial Game, edited by Keith A. Sandiford and Brian Stoddart, shows how male colonial subjects embraced Britain's national game as a way to challenge im‐ perial authority.[4] While the Austro-Hungarian Empire is not parallel to the vast British Empire, particularly because race was less of a factor, scholars in our feld would do well to ask how the Czechs and other minorities reshaped the mascu‐ line body to "speak" to their empire. Nolte provides us with a microcosm of Bo‐ hemian politics from 1862-1914, and I hope future scholars will use her painstaking and organized research to launch other projects on the national body. With Nolte's work as inspiration, Habsburg specialists can look to the physical body as anoth‐ er site where the nation is constructed and recon‐ structed. Notes [1]. George L. Mosse, Nationalization of the Masses: Political Symbolism and Mass Move‐ ments in Germany, from the Napoleonic Wars through the Third Reich (Ithaca: Cornell Universi‐ ty Press, 1991; reprint, New York: H. Fertig, 2001). [2]. George L. Mosse, Nationalism and Sexual‐ ity: Respectability and Abnormal Sexuality in Modern Europe (New York: H. Fertig, 1985; re‐ print, New York: H. Fertig, 1997). 3 H-Net Reviews If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at https://networks.h-net.org/habsburg Citation: Cynthia Paces. Review of Nolte, Claire E. The Sokol in the Czech Lands to 1914: Training for the Nation. HABSBURG, H-Net Reviews. June, 2004. URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=9516 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 4.

Load more

  4

Copy Link