scholarly journals The Ballad in Eastern European Jewish Folklore: Origins, Poetics, Music

2020 ◽  
pp. 191-228
Author(s):  
Michael Lukin ◽  

Analysis of the poetics and music of Yiddish folk ballads reveals that the Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe did not preserve German songs,widely popular among them up to the beginning of their gradual migration to the east, but instead developed a ballad repertoire of their own.The group of songs, designated as “medieval” by Sophia Magid, the author of a monumental study on the Yiddish ballad, includes both old ballads and those borrowed from the Germans towards the end of the 18th century and later. While the borrowed songs carried a similarity to the German originals as shown in their melodic contours, vocabulary, and plots, the old Yiddish ballads, though generally echoing both Slavic and Western European balladry, differed significantly. The article attempts to identify and characterize this older layer. It apparently first came into being in Central and Eastern Europe in the 15th 16th centuries and continued to develop until the new“urban” ballad emerged in the mid 1800s.The poetics and music of the Yiddish ballad reflect the genre’s hallmark – ballad-singing as a form of communication – which distinguished it from the Yiddish lyric song, performed “for oneself”. The ballad melodies lack melismatic embellishments and dramatic shifts; their tempo is usually moderate; some of them frequently feature the “Ionic minor” rhythmic pattern; many others resemble Klezmer dance music. These features reflect Yiddish ballad aesthetics: music is an ostensibly neutral frame for revealing a narrative that evokes emotions without referring to them directly.Two features of the international ballad canon – readiness to draw material from diverse sources, and a focus on the collective emotional response to key moments of everyday life–stimulated the formation of the indigenous Yiddish tradition. Its character also reflected the remoteness of Eastern Ashkenazi folk culture from rural Slavic folklore, and the lack of a permanent social function of balladsinging in the Ashkenazi tradition.

2013 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 9-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Grzegorz Zabłocki

Abstract This article is an analysis of differences and similarities between four Englishlanguage journals on rural sociology. The comparison covered topics discussed in about 600 articles published in the journals in the years 1995-2010 and the regional affiliation of their authors. In the comparison, all articles and texts on empirical research published in this period in Eastern European Countryside were considered. In total, 141 texts were published in this annual journal. Out of the three other journals (Rural Sociology, Sociologia Ruralis, Journal of Rural Studies) 50 articles for each of three periods: 1995-1996, 2002-2003, 2008-2009, were selected. Results of the comparison show that the journals have strictly regional profiles, and that present rural sociology does not seem to be the science on social phenomena in world-wide rural areas. Rural sociology used in the four studied journals does not develop the knowledge that would be useful in solving problems of the rural population. In the three journals under study (Rural Sociology, Sociologia Ruralis, Journal of Rural Studies) almost exclusively sociology of rural areas in Western Europe and Northern America was developed, and their contributors were almost always authors from the two regions. The fourth journal - Eastern European Countryside - was concerned, adequately to its title, with rural phenomena in Central and Eastern Europe


2021 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 69-84
Author(s):  
Csilla Polster

The study investigates the economic growth in Central and Eastern Europe in the last 25 years. The economy can be regarded as a substantial topic in any country, but it is even more interesting in developing countries. One of the basic ideas of the European Union is the convergence between member states, namely the reduction of development disparities, which can be achieved through faster economic growth in less‑developed countries. Growth theory is one of the main topics in economics. Its significant importance is because the desire for development is one of the main driving forces of mankind. The aim of the study is to reveal the crucial differences and common features between the growth paths of the eleven Central and Eastern European member states of the European Union. After presenting growth theories, the growth performance of the examined Central and Eastern European member states is pinpointed. During the research, GDP per capita, population, migration, activity rate, employment rate, unemployment rate, foreign direct investment and foreign trade openness are considered.


2020 ◽  
Vol 43 (338) ◽  
pp. 61-66
Author(s):  
Sandris Ancans

AbstractThe economy of Latvia lags behind economically developed nations approximately fourfold in terms of labour productivity in the tradable sector, which is the key constituent of a modern economy, thereby affecting future sustainable development in the entire country, including the rural areas. The economic backwardness is characteristic of the entire Central and Eastern Europe. This is the heritage of a communist regime that lasted for about half a century and the economic system termed a (centrally) planned economy or a command economy. However, such a term for the communist-period economy is not correct, as it does not represent the purpose it was created for. Accordingly, the paper aims to assess the effect of the communism period on the economic backwardness of the Central and Eastern European region of the EU. A planned economy that existed in all communist countries, with the exception of Yugoslavia, was not introduced to contribute to prosperity. It was intended for confrontation or even warfare by the communist countries under the guidance of the USSR against other countries where no communism regime existed, mostly Western world nations with their market economies. For this reason, it is not correct to term it a (centrally) planned economy or a command economy; the right term is a mobilised (war) economy. An extrapolation of a geometric progression for GDP revealed that during the half a century, Latvia as part of the USSR was forced to spend on confrontation with the West not less than EUR 17 bln. (2011 prices) or approximately one gross domestic product of 2011. The research aim of the paper is to assess the effect of the communism period on the economic backwardness of the Central and Eastern European region of the EU.


2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-84
Author(s):  
Daniel Haman ◽  
◽  
Darko Iljkić ◽  
Ivana Varga

The Treaty of Karlowitz signed in 1699 concluded the rule of the Ottoman Empire in most parts of Central and Eastern Europe. Liberation of Osijek in 1687, and consequently of whole Slavonia in 1699 brought a new era of freedom and prosperity to its citizens. At least for a short time, since the Habsburg Monarchy re-established their rule over the country by bringing feudal laws and regulations back into force. Austrian empress and Hungarian-Croatian Queen Maria Theresa united Slavonia with Croatia, and re-established the counties of Virovitica, Požega and Syrmia, meaning that the regional administration of Slavonia was completely relinquished to the civil authorities.


2020 ◽  
pp. 162-181
Author(s):  
Ireneusz Paweł Karolewski

This chapter focuses on Central and Eastern European (CEE) member states of the EU, and how they positioned themselves in the new constellation of conflicts within the EU in the aftermath of the multiple crisis. It deals mainly with the Visegrad Group (V4) and explores its ‘repositioning’ in regard to two crisis-ridden policy fields of the EU: controversies about the rule of law and the refugee crisis. With regard to the former issue, the chapter discusses Poland as the most prominent case among the CEE countries. Against this background, it highlights two specific aspects of domestic politics: the memory games that the V4 countries play with their past and the Euroscepticism of government circles as well as a broader public.


1994 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 141-190
Author(s):  
Marta Kiszely

Due to the rapid changes in the legal systems of Central and Eastern European countries and the republics of the former Soviet Union, the question that researchers and librarians nowadays face is how to get current foreign materials in English in a reliable published form. Only two years ago the problem was that there were no comprehensive, consistent, and current sources in English translations. Today the problem is not so much finding sources as being certain of the reliability and continuity of the available sources. There is a boom in new publications and services (both primary and secondary, both in paper and in electronic format), but one cannot always count on them for timely, regular publication, and consistent scope of coverage.


2016 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-100 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aija Lulle

The Eastern European political and para-political responses to the ‘refugee crisis’ demonstrate a schism between the ‘old’ and the ‘new Europe’. Hostile attitudes reveal how unresolved post-imperial pasts currently manifest themselves in a seeming inability to show solidarity and empathy for the human suffering of others. To address this question critically, I utilize the notion of ‘independence’ to disentangle the specific neoliberal political mentality that has developed in the Central and Eastern European region, along with a variety of ethno-nationalisms which relive their own past wounds. In countries which have wiped away almost all reminders of their socialist past, solidarity and collectivity are not widely subscribed-to values. Apart from the immediate need to act alongside other European countries and help to accommodate current refugee flows, the Eastern Bloc has a long and necessary journey ahead. This is to negotiate and address their own social and cultural pluralities, which have been deliberately ignored in the rush to join the club of the worlds’ wealthiest democracies in the EU. During this formally accelerated political process, insufficient attention has been paid to social transformations in these new EU countries, including their reluctance to take in and accommodate new migrants and refugees.


2016 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 263-290
Author(s):  
Filip Ilkowski

This article addresses newly emerging interstate rivalry between Central and Eastern European states based on unevenness of capitalist development and growing assertiveness of particular states in terms of their various strategies and tactics. It critically analyses the efficacy of ‘New Warsaw Pacts’ concepts and argues that in the Central and Eastern European area, we observe a specific form of a post–Cold War multi-polarity, whereby interstate rivalry is becoming increasingly more complex. The term of ‘Beggar Imperialism’ is utilized as a possibly useful description of a specific form geopolitical strategy shown by the example of Poland.


European View ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 231-238 ◽  
Author(s):  
Viktória Jančošekovà

Regional cooperation is mutually beneficial collaboration between neighbouring countries. This holds regardless of whether it is a matter of cooperation between the Benelux countries, the Nordic–Baltic states, France and Germany, or the Visegrad countries. The last-mentioned countries' dismissive attitude to tackling the migration crisis has thrust them into the limelight. The most recent cooperative forums in the Central Eastern Europe region, such as the Slavkov Triangle and the Three Seas Initiative, evidence a new dynamic and a regrouping of forces on the basis of national interests and EU themes. Western and Eastern Europe have different approaches to the most pressing challenges, such as migration. These differences have caused deep divisions between their respective leaders. However, the disagreements on the migration issue and the future of the EU notwithstanding, regional cooperation among the Central and Eastern European countries remains valuable in areas that include the integration process, security and defence.


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