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The author focuses her attention on two major problems related to the charity sector in Bulgaria: its ambiguous public perception and the role of the state and its institutions in building its public image. Unlike education, which the society invariably recognized as a value, and all its development initiatives were considered laudable, a number of other causes did not enjoy such success. Some were slowly gaining popularity, others were perceived with outright distrust or even rejection. The reasons are mainly related to the then level of maturity of the civil sector, to the modernization of society as a whole. State and local governments in major cities worked to promote philanthropic events. Thus, the understanding of charity as a laudable and trustworthy activity, which educated citizens in public solidarity, mutual assistance and empathy, began to prevail in society.
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This paper aims at presenting the acts of book and document censorship within the library of «Griechisch-orientalische kaiserlich-königliche Obergymnasium in Suczawa», the first high school from southern Bukowina, founded by imperial decree on the 30th of June 1860, in which German was the tuition language, today known as Colegiul Național “Ștefan cel Mare” from Suceava. This study is based on original archive documents, previous studies on the topic and documents from the school library. Relying on historical research approaches, the phenomenon of book censorship is analysed during all polical regimes that succeeded in the nearly 160 years of existance of the school library. The paper points to the restrictions imposed during the Austrian rule (1860-1918), the cleansing and even total distruction of the most valuable books belonging to the Romanian heritage during the totalitarian regimes after the Great Union of 1918, the reorganisation of the special collections, the restriction of the public accessibility to certain titles. This paper, alongside previous ones on the same topic, is meant to contribute to the understanding of the complex phenomenon of censorship in Romanian libraries.
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Review of: Hanna Kozinska-Witt - Hanna Grzeszczuk-Brendel: Eine Stadt zum Leben. Städtebau und Wohnungsreform in Posen in der ersten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts. Übers. von Sandra Ewers. De Gruyter/ Oldenbourg. Berlin – Boston 2018. 412 S., Ill., Kt. ISBN 978-3-11-054804-4. (€ 44,95.)
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Review of: Exploring Loyalty. Hrsg. von Jana Osterkamp und Martin Schulze Wessel. (Veröffentlichungen des Collegium Carolinum, Bd. 136.) Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Göttingen – Bristol, CT 2017. VI, 240 S., Ill. ISBN 978-3-525-37317-0. (€ 50,–.). Reviewed by Tomáš Nigrin.
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The paper aims to prove the impact of the totalitarian regime on individuals, society and interpersonal relationships, reflected in personal letters, as well as the consequences of this impact. The research object includes the epistolary legacy of the 19th-century Georgian poet and public figure, the General of the Russian Army, Grigol Orbeliani, and that of the 20th-century Georgian historian, founder and Rector of Tbilisi State University, Ivane Javakhishvili. They both were members of the Georgian society, on extremely different sides, owing to their beliefs and worldviews: the former was an active participant in the creation of the totalitarian regime and represented the foothold of Russian authority in fulfilling the forcible policy in the Caucasus, and the latter was a victim of the totalitarian regime; by keeping the national values, worldviews, and personal freedom, he opposed authority. As a result, he became an object of persecution and insult. The comparative analysis of the two different epochs has once again revealed that Bolshevism was a logical extension of Tsarist Russia’s imperial policy: in both epochs, the Russian sovereignty used similar methods to implement and maintain a totalitarian regime: obtaining the public confidence, dividing the society, encouraging people to denounce and doom each other in order to create successful careers and so on. By bringing the examples from modern life, the work shows that, despite the fact that communism has fallen, its influence on society is still evident.
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Research on Jews who converted to Christianity before and during the Holocaust has been scarce until recently, although since the 1980s survivors’ testimonies began to mention such experiences more often. This article offers a first general overview of 97 testimonies found in the Fortunoff Video Archive of Holocaust Testimonies that describe the experience of conversion of Holocaust survivors. Based on the information provided by these testimonies it 1) analyses the attitudes of Christian and Jewish institutions and individuals towards converts and 2) explores the way in which the experience of conversion impacted the sense of belonging and Jewish identity of the survivors.
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This article aims at studying cultural diplomacy tools used in the diplomatic relations between Ukraine and Bulgaria by the first Embassy of the Ukrainian People’s Republic in Sofia. Ukrainsko Slovo and the Ukrainsko-Bulgarski Pregled played an important part in shaping the public opinion of Ukraine among Bulgarian intellectuals of that time and aroused the interest of the local press in the newly established Ukrainian state. The analysis of the cultural activities of the diplomats of the Ukrainian People’s Republic in 1918–1920 enables to track the evolution of key cultural perceptions of Ukraine by Bulgarians as well as of original ways of implementation of Ukraine’s cultural and humanitarian policy in Bulgaria. The Ukrainsko-Bulgarski Pregled may be deemed a prototype of modern websites and Facebook accounts of diplomatic missions, taking into account similar public diplomacy objectives and tasks. Therefore, the Ukrainsko Slovo and the Ukrainsko-Bulgarski Pregled are a unique source for cross-subject studies of the relations between the newly established Ukrainian People’s Republic that strived for its statehood and the Kingdom of Bulgaria that was among the first to support Ukraine’s independence. Further analysis of the publications in the journals will enable modern researchers to get a deeper understanding of that period of intercultural relations between Ukraine and Bulgaria against the background of a complex geopolitical situation in Europe after the end of World War I.
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Due to certain similarities in their historical development (discontinuance of statehood for longer periods of time, for one thing), Bulgarians and Poles have demonstrated time and again sympathy for each other. Bulgaria was among the first countries to recognize the restored Polish state after WWI. Diplomatic relations between the two countries can be divided into two main periods. The first period started officially with the opening of the legation of the Polish Republic in Sofia in January 1919 and (about two years later) of the legation of the Kingdom of Bulgaria in Warsaw, and ended with Bulgaria’s joining the Tripartite Pact in March 1941. Despite their converse positions regarding the post-WWI settlement, during this period the Bulgarian-Polish relations gradually developed into serious cooperation in trade, armaments, education, science, and culture. In 1939–1941, Bulgarians rendered much needed assistance to Poles whose lives were in danger after the aggression against their country. The second period in the development of Bulgarian-Polish relations that started officially in late 1945 has two distinct subperiods, with events of the late 1980s – early 1990s serving as the dividing line. Until then, relations between Bulgaria and Poland proceeded within the Eastern Bloc framework, as members of the COMECON and the Warsaw Pact. After the disintegration of the Eastern Bloc, with the two countries generally taking the same path of development, and despite national specificities playing a part in the speed of their joining NATO and the EU, Bulgaria and Poland found much common ground for mutual understanding. Currently, Sofia and Warsaw support projects like the Three Seas Initiative and the Via Carpathia highway network, and are actively opposing the idea of a two-speed or multi-speed Europe. At the end of the 21st century’s second decade, it can be said that Bulgarian-Polish relations are characterized by the prevalence of common interests.
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The author of this paper notes the key tendencies in the historiographical study of the given topic and tries to identify the promising areas of the further research of “the GULAG” stage in the history of the Russian scientific and technical intelligentsia. The analysis of the historical literature presented in the article has allowed the author to draw the following conclusions. For today almost all historians recognize the fact that repressions, which were subjected to the scientific and technical intelligentsia in the USSR in the late 1920s—1930s, had planned, organized character and were conditioned of the change of domestic political priorities of the Soviet government. The curtailment of the NEP and the transition to the accelerated industrialization, which was carried out by methods of non-economic coercion, pushed the ruling elite led by Stalin to the ruthless suppression of intelligentsia as the social force which not only shared the principles of the NEP but also made a significant practical contribution to the implementation of that doctrine. Tens of thousands of people were imprisoned due to the obviously illegal criminal prosecution of specialists. Based on extensive documentary materials from declassified archival funds the researchers convincingly show that the GULAG was in dire need of highly qualified personnel since the punitive Department played one of the key roles in the process of the industrialization. These conceptual provisions seem to be generally accepted in the modern Russian historiography. The practice of compulsory attraction of specialists to work has been much less studied. Further development of the topic requires analysis of a wide range of materials reflecting the use of forced labor of the scientific and technical intelligentsia as in the whole GULAG and within different industries and regions. Detailed study of these issues will allow historians to take important steps in the research of economic efficiency of the GULAG.
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In the focus of the article is a criminal case which was instituted by OGPU (Obyedinennoe Gosudarstvennoe Politicheskoe Upravlenie) against the ministers of Islamic religion in Leningrad in 1932. One of the accused was the last mufti of the Russian empire, Mohammed-Safa Bayazitov (1877–1937). Besides Bayazitov and the members of the so-called “dvadtsatka” (the congregational council of the mosque), the investigating authorities also arrested underground mullahs who had unofficially conducted religious rites among the Muslims of Leningrad. The latter activity caused serious apprehensions among OGPU by virtue of the very fact of its existence, since it was practically beyond the control of the authorities. The criminal case of 1932 is interesting not least because it puts into circulation new data concerning the biography of M.-S. Bayazitov (in particular, details about his work as imam-khatib of the Leningrad Cathedral Mosque in 1931–1932). Despite the image of a secret officer of the imperial security service (ohranka) that Bayazitov had in Soviet times, he continued to enjoy authority among a certain part of believers in Leningrad. The case materials are also a valuable source of information about the daily life of the Muslims of Leningrad in the second half of the 1920s — early 1930s. In particular, as can be seen from the testimony of the accused and the witnesses who were involved in the case, the principle of fellowship in the period under review continued to be of great importance to Tatars in Leningrad.
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Review of: Archivführer zur ungarndeutschen Geschichte in den Komitatsarchiven Ungarns 1760-1950. Hrsg. von Erzsébet Apró und Ágnes Tóth. (Schriften des Bundesinstituts für Kultur und Geschichte im östlichen Europa, Bd. 44.) Oldenbourg. München 2013. 1094 S. ISBN 978-3-486- 71207-0. (€ 98,–.). Reviewed by Wolfgang Kessler.
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The “national” operations of the NKVD during the Great Terror remain one of the hottest debates in Soviet history. The sharp gap between the Bolsheviks’ previous national policy encourages historians to advance various explanations about what happened. Some scholars believe that “national” operations were based on an ethnization of the image of the enemy, and as a result, the ethnic aspect allegedly received a priority over the social aspect in the punitive policy of Stalinism. Other historians believe the main reason for the “national” operations of the NKVD was the authorities’ desire to eliminate any ties of Soviet citizens with the “hostile capitalist environment.” The article presents directives and internal statistics of the NKVD, found in the Central Archive of the FSB of the Russian Federation and previously unknown to researchers. The authors discuss the thesis of the ethnic component of the Great Terror, using the example of the “German” operation in Kazakhstan. The “national” operations were ambivalent. Under conditions of such “landscapes” as industry, transport, and the army, total terror was aimed at “nationals” with practically no selection of victims. However, in the countryside, in the “outback” of the USSR, in places of compact residences of “hostile” ethnic “contingents,” the state security bodies actively selected their victims. Thus, in the Kazakh SSR, the Germans deported to Kazakhstan in 1931–1936 and who were extremely dissatisfied with their living conditions became the main target group of the “German” operation. Germans who voluntarily moved to Kazakhstan before 1917 suffered much less.
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Review of: Iris Engemann: Die Slowakisierung Bratislavas. Universität, Theater und Kultusgemeinden 1918-1948. (Studien zur Sozial- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte Europas, Bd. 22.) Harrassowitz. Wiesbaden 2012. 287 S., graph. Darst., Kt. ISBN 978-3-447-06640-2. (€ 52,–.). Reviewed by Katharina Wessely.
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Stefan Żywotko’s oral history account is a story about almost one hundred years of Polish history from the perspective of a person who was a football player and coach. His account includes, among others, the themes of the interwar Lviv, the II World War, post-war Szczecin, the beginnings of football in Western Poland, and a story about Algeria in the 1970s and 1980s. It is also an interesting source about this person, who has been very successful in sport but is not widely known in Poland.
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The publication presents opinions on the Bulgarian national question of eight scientists from Central and Eastern Europe, incl. Czech Republic, Poland and Russia. They were elected foreign members of the Macedonian Scientific Institute because of their contribution to the promotion of the national cause. Attention is paid to the policy on the Macedonian question of the countries from which the scientists come. Their works in the field of language, history and ethnography are presented, revealing the Bulgarian national identity of the majority of the population in Macedonia.
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In 1918, the Czech journalist and public figure Vladimir Sis published his book on Macedonia, originally published in Czech in 1914 in German, in neutral Switzerland. The publication aimed to present to a wide European audience the characteristics of Macedonia in ethnographic, linguistic, educational, cultural and historical terms. Sis pleaded in defense of the Bulgarian national cause and for the accession of Macedonia to Bulgaria. The purpose of this edition is particularly clear in the preface and conclusion, published here in Bulgarian translation.
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Egypt, which has an ancient history and culture, has been home to many civilizations and has also accommodated many scientists. With more than a thousand years of history, Azhar University has been a pioneer in the field of religious education, especially in the Islamic world for centuries. In yet another scientific and cultural center of the Islamic world it was also present territory of Turkey and earlier Ottoman and Seljuk. Both cultural environments contributed to the development of various branches of science. Egypt, which remained under Ottoman rule for a long time, was naturally influenced by the educational methods and contents of the Ottoman Empire during this period. However, by the 20th century, both countries continued to exist as a separate state and continued their path with their own internal dynamics. When we approach the subject in the context of philosophy and logic studies, it is seen that Egypt has started the studies in this field because of the changes they have experienced in history. Here influential factor, followed by the establishment of a new government in Turkey is taking time circuit consisting of the institutions. For example, although its history is based on Fatih Madrasah, Istanbul University was founded in 1933, while Ankara University was founded in 1946. However, the first modern university in Egypt, Cairo University was founded in 1908. Since academic studies are mostly related to universities, studies in various fields are shaped accordingly. In this context, the logic seems to have begun work in Egypt before Turkey. This study aims to present the subject by evaluating the qualitative and quantitative data of both countries in general terms.
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