Elemér Boreczky, Phd, Hungary Course Description CENTRAL
Elemér Boreczky, PhD, Hungary Course description CENTRAL EUROPE AND THE ARCHEOLOGY OF CULTURE What do cultural monuments tell us about reclaiming the lost inheritance of European culture in the” less known” lands of the former Kingdom of Hungary, now integrated into the nation states of Hungary, Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, Serbia, Croatia and Austria? In an attempt to give a tentative answer to this question, the course reveals various layers of culture behind cultural monuments. It uses the frame of reference of cultural studies, especially that of regional studies, which have evolved as an independent field the former. Regional studies have also contributed to the emergence of recent interest in re-interpreting travelogues that have played a role in “re-inventing Eastern-Europe” by Western travelers 300 years after “Ungaria,” “Polonia,” Grecia,” and “Germania” had been demarcated as four of the nine political entities on the map of Europe made by Pope Pius II, the first person to think of the continent as a political-cultural entity by that name. However, by the time of the American and French Revolution, “Ungaria,” “Polonia,” and “Grecia” had been virtually erased from the map, and re-emerged as small nation states in the 19th century. Students have the opportunity to learn, and make use of, the skill of “reading the landscape” by identifying a cultural scene within a broader cultural field and find meaning in the various artifacts that capture the attention of the traveler, the reader of literature, the art movie fan, or the music lover, let alone politicians and business people with vested interests in the region.
[Show full text]