10. Lives Divided In The Second World War: The Individual And The Master Narrative Of War

Südosteuropa ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 65 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gentiana Kera

AbstractThe Second World War in Albania was a central topic of socialist historiography because of the importance laid upon the National Liberation War for the legitimation of the establishment of communist rule in 1944. History writing was a very centralized process, controlled by party institutions responsible for safeguarding the implementation of Marxist‒Leninist principles and party lines. Since the 1990s, the history of the Second World War has been revised in the framework of a general revision of Albanian national history. History writing developed as an open process and now included historians from countries other than Albania, as opposed to the previous state socialist isolation. The extent to which the war history had been distorted and manipulated during socialism has influenced the subsequent process of rewriting that first focused on adjusting the existing narratives. Thus, despite an increasing variety of research topics, the historiography on wartime Albania has remained dominated by political and military history, and by the national master narrative.


Author(s):  
John M. Owen

Liberalism always has been concerned with the security of the individual against violence and deprivation. Liberal approaches to international security focus on institutions, or collectively held rules, as mediating between material variables and international outcomes. States are arenas of contestation among individuals and groups, and differ according to their institutions. International realms are distinguished by the number, type, and membership of institutions. The realms are linked: liberal democracies construct and maintain liberal international institutions. As the increase of peaceful, wealthy democracies since the Second World War shows, these states have relatively secure citizens and enjoy comparative international success. In the future, the liberal order could be weakened by the ongoing rise of nonliberal China; escalations of transnational terrorism; and alienation from liberalism within the wealthy democracies. Future liberal security scholarship should attend to differences among non-democracies; causal links between domestic and international institutions; and the co-evolution of states and the international environment.


2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 565-592 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colleen Hayes ◽  
Kerry Jacobs

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to revisit the issue of the entry of women into the Anglo-Australian accounting profession in the Second World War and provide insights on the role that gender, class, and ethnicity played in mediating women’s relations with the accounting profession in that period. Design/methodology/approach The study is based on the narratives of three women from diverse social backgrounds who entered the Anglo-Australian profession during this period. Findings The analysis indicates that while participants had the mindset needed for accounting work, the more removed the individual’s perceived social identity was from her perception of the dominant British, white, middle-class ideology of the profession, the less likely she was to embrace the opportunity to join the accounting profession. The distance was anchored in social (ethnicity and class) and historical forces. The study also finds that the appropriation of education and credentials ameliorated disadvantages accruing from gender and working-class status. Practical implications This study has implications for our understanding of the accounting profession and what is required to reduce the risks of marginalization in a contemporary setting. Originality/value The study provides a richer understanding of how class and ethnicity shape the female experience differently. The results also demonstrate that in times of social change, the processes of inclusion and exclusion are not confined to the deliberations of the accounting profession but also the individual. Whether the women valued accounting as an occupation depended on whether or not if offered them the freedom to achieve what they valued most. At the same time, however, the freedom to realize what they valued most was a function of class and ethnicity. Finally, the results demonstrate the capacity of unique experience to shape the perceptions, aspirations and actions of women.


2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zlatica Sáposová ◽  
Miroslava Gallová

After the Second World War, the Czechoslovak Republic actively participated in migratory movements taking place in Central and Eastern Europe in order to get rid of the two most numerous ethnic groups - Hungarian and German. In order to fulfil its ideas, it used forced relocation, the exchange of population on the basis of an agreement, as well as the internal relocation of the population. The mechanical movement of the population on the territory of Slovakia took place intensively in the southern regions inhabited by the inhabitants of Hungarian nationality. The migration (resettlement, relocation) of the population was able to break the unified ethnic character of southern Slovakia and create ethnically mixed areas. This paper focuses on the means used by Czechoslovakia to reduce the population of Hungarian nationality. We chose municipalities in which various forms of migration appeared, while in each of the selected municipalities a different form of resettlement was dominant and at the same time we monitored its impact on the ethnic structure of the municipality. In the individual municipalities surveyed, based on censuses, there was no radical change in ethnic structure (even in the long term), despite the fact that the number of immigrants was considerable. URL: https://vsas.fvs.upjs.sk/


2015 ◽  
Vol 59 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-136
Author(s):  
Joanna Zalewska

The aim of this article is to analyze the interdependence between the processes of forming mass markets and the processes of rationalizing emotion and the shaping of modern hedonism. The author uses the perspective of Norbert Elias’s process sociology, in which the monopolization of resources results in the growth of dependence between all the inhabitants of the territory encompassed by the monopoly, and this is accompanied by a civilizing process, or the rationalization of the behaviours of individuals. The author presents the idea that the integration process at the level of humanity, as survival unit on the platform of the global market and consumption culture, is ongoing. As an example, the author analyzes the first stage in the consumer revolution in Poland after the Second World War, where fashion was shaped on one side by the socialist ideology of progress, and on the other by the romantic ethic present in communications from the West. Individual emotion as a factor guiding behaviour corresponds to the logic of the market, and fashion is the process of mediating between the market and the individual.


Author(s):  
Alison Chand

This chapter examines the extent to which civilian men working in Clydeside during the war possessed distinctive and unique regional subjectivities. The chapter considers issues such as national identity and feelings of solidarity with men working in reserved occupations in other British regions. The chapter primarily argues, however, that distinctive regional aspects to worker subjectivity in Glasgow and Clydeside are revealed in oral testimonies. Much evidence emerges of local pride in industries around the Clyde. While some of this can be linked to the specific contribution of the region to the British war effort, such pride can also be attributed to feelings of deep knowledge, understanding and awareness of the region as a distinct locality, based on the immediacy and proximity of everyday life in the area to the subjectivities of reserved men. Indeed, the majority of oral testimonies reflect the notion that men in reserved occupations in wartime were often indifferent to the idea of ‘imagined’ British nationality, adhering more to local regional subjectivities. The attitudes of women towards male civilian workers, and consequently the subjectivities of reserved workers themselves, were firmly rooted in the immediacy of the distinctive industrial and working class environment of Clydeside. However, such local subjectivity often had a narrower focus than the city of Glasgow or the entity of Clydeside and was restricted to the places and people best known and most familiar to men. Although different levels of collective, ‘imagined’ subjectivity existed during the Second World War and were highly significant, ‘lived’ and continuous local subjectivity was inevitably most relevant to the individual male civilian worker in wartime.


Author(s):  
Marina V. Novikova ◽  

The article attempts to characterize the state of historical con- sciousness of the Germans at the end of the 20th – beginning of the 21 st century. The article examines what factors influenced the formation of the “sacrificial narrative” in the collective memory of the Germans of the united Germany. The research is based on the publications in the German, Polish and Russian press, autobiographical works, interviews, diaries and memoirs of Gunther Grass, Gerhard Schroeder, etc., analyzes the works of art and filmography released at that time. Memories of the suffering of the German civilian population during the Second World War usually belonged to the individual memory or remained part of the German family history. True, the traumatic past was often used for political purposes, especially in the FRG in the matters related to the theme of exile. In the first decade of the new millennium, thanks to the changes in the cultural agenda – the release of a number of books and feature films, the plot of which was based on the suffering of the Germans, the traumatic past is at the center of public debate. However, the rethinking of the theme of the suffering of the German civilian population was met with a rather wary response in the global context, primarily from Poland and the victor countries.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Shammas

For many historians, the "Great Man" theory--emphasizing the centrality of powerful leaders in changing history--has (rightly) fallen out of fashion. Less credit is given to leaders; more attention is paid to the average person. Concurrently, for many international relations theorists, the demands of realpolitik and geopolitics are emphasized while the individual personalities of leaders and the collective personalities of cultures are de-emphasized. Yet, while the "Great Man" theory of history is limiting, certain historical events simply cannot be explained without reference to the passions, motives, and personalities of individual leaders. Relatedly, though the competitive desire for resources can explain some wars, the fiercest conflicts are fought not over tangible goods but over abstract ideals. The Second Punic War proves both points: Almost entirely on his own, for reasons related more to culture and ideals than resources, one remarkable man--Hannibal Barca--triggered the ancient world's deadliest world war. The next time resentment over an unfair treaty, bitterness, one driven leader, and clashing ideals would trigger such large-scale conflict would not occur until the Second World War.


2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 81-99
Author(s):  
Benjámin Dávid

The societies of the countries underwent many difficulties during the history of the 20th century. During World War II, in addition to the military loss of the country, there was a significant loss of civilian population. Due to the changed political circumstances after the war, the processing of these events at the individual, community, and social levels didn’t take place. The research of the MTA–SZTE Oral History and History Education Research Team (2016– 2020) focuses on how to include video interview details with people who have experienced the turning points in the Hungarian history of the 20th century and how to include them in classroom education. Concerning these the classes supplemented with a video details undergoes appropriate (subject-pedagogical) methodological preparation. In my study I examine that Hungary’s participation in the Second World War working group working within a research group how well the classes compiled, supplemented by life-course interviews, attracted the attention of the students, helped them understand the curriculum and its contexts, and what conveyed values to the students.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valentyna Shaikan ◽  
Andrii Shaikan

The authors examined in complex the reasons, the typical and special demonstrations of such difficult appearances-phenomena as complicity and collaborationism on the territory of the Reich Commissariat "Ukraina" and the zone of the military Hitler administration in the years of the Second World War in their work; the problem is investigated on the basis of the significant amount of the poorly-known or the unknown for the researchers archival documents of the Ukrainian archives' storehouses, at the historical-philosophical and social-psychological level; grasping the idea of the complex social processes, the authors tried to define the water-parting between the demonstrations of the spontaneous or the organized population's self-activity of the occupied territories, the conscious, the voluntary and the forced collaboration with the occupants, showed the motivation of the behavior's different models at the individual and group (collective) levels. New is the positing and interpreting of the problem as the strategy of people survival on the extreme conditions of war. The authors made the typology of different demonstrations of collaboration and complicity in dependence on the specific conditions, the character of the occupation regime, the mental and the moral-psychological factors, ect. The reply to such sharp and touchy questions as, in the first turn, the survival strategy of the Ukrainian population during the Hitler occupation, the activity of the military-political structures, the characteristic features and peculiarities of the social-economic, cultural and religious life, the character of the international relations, the activity of the Ukrainian social-political institutions at the beginning of war and others, in the authors' opinion, will help in creation of the objective and complete picture of the Second World War.


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