Bosnia and Herzegovina under the Communist Regime: an Outlook on Educational Policy

Bosnia and Herzegovina as one of the nine republics of Yugoslavia was always among the poorest republics in the former state. However, the school system, as it was the case in the totalitarian regimes, was under direct control of the state. The state had the power to influence school programs and to decide who could apply for school profession. After World War II, education became compulsory for all children and the state could have influenced easily all aspects of education. The state conception how to educate a new society and how to produce a common Yugoslav identity was in focus of the new ideology and those who did not agree with this concept were exposed to negative connotations and even to persecution. Human rights of an individual were openly proclaimed but not respected. Totalitarian societies commonly expect the system of education to operate as a main transformational force that will facilitate the creation of the new man in the social order they have proclaimed. After the split of the Soviet model of pedagogy (1945–1949), the changes occurred in education when the communists established a new regime with universal characteristics of the Yugoslavian education which differentiated among the republics in accordance with their own specificities. Bosnia and Herzegovina with its multi-ethnic nature occupied a special place inside the common state as a model that served as a creation of possible, multiethnic, socialist Yugoslavia.

Ideological Imperative of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia in Activity of Universities in Slovakia (1948–1953)

The paper on the base of archive materials, published documents and scientific literature analyzes situation that occurred at Slovak universities after Communist coup in February 1948, with a focus on ideological pressure of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia in this segment of society. The paper documents means that Communist Party of Czechoslovakia used to transform educational process and other activities in such a way that universities became subservient to communist ideology – the Marxism-Leninism. The paper is devoting attention to setting-up the Marxism-Leninism as the self-standing topic into academic program of universities.

They Were “Heroes”. Conceptual and Narrative Analysis of the Figure of a Free Teacher in a Totalitarian Society

Despite the context of contemporary post-heroic indifference, our intention is to re-analyze the concept of heroism, not in the modernist (totalizing and iconic), or in the post-modernist (de-heroizing and ironic) way, but in the optics of hermeneutic re-reading of the specific teachers’ stories from the Stalinist years of the totalitarian regime. In the contribution we bring a conceptual identification of features of the ethical-characterial understanding of “hero without a halo”, by which we want to break the simplistic dichotomy between heroic and everyday – we introduce a third concept – “a hero of everyday life”. We point out how the mythical-idealistic idea of heroism perverted to a collective ideology and how the reality of the communist totalitarian regime in Czechoslovakia demanded heroes – heroes of everyday life. The aim of the research is to find the occurrence of the identifying features of the “everyday hero” in particular stories of three teachers from the times of socialist Czechoslovakia, with the help of narrative analysis.

The Political Religion of Communism in Hungarian Children’s Choir Compositions between 1958–1989

Like all cultures, totalitarian regimes develop their own symbols and rituals. As such symbols, music and music making play an important role in expressing values, norms of the community, as well as in providing models for living in it (Geertz, 1973). They are especially valuable tools for educating children. This paper summarizes the result of a pilot study in the lyrics of choral pieces for children, that were distributed along with the state-published methodological journal, Énektanítás [Teaching Singing] and its continuation, Az ének-zene tanítása [Teaching Singing-Music] between 1958–1989. Using political religion (Gentile, 2006) as conceptual framework for content analysis, the study presents: 1) how different characteristics of the communist doctrine appeared in the lyrics of choral pieces and 2) how they changed over time, outlining the life-cycle of the regime itself from militant mass movements to giving place to expressions of individualism and alternative faiths until it would dissolve in the end.

Polish Social Pedagogy in the Stalinist Period (1945–1956)

The social pedagogy is an important, specific part of the Polish pedagogy, with a unique character – since it began to emerge at the end of the 19th century in Polish lands. Although it developed very dynamically in the interwar period, both theoretically and institutionally and in terms of practical activities, after 1945 it experienced some great difficulties in returning to normal functioning in the scientific world, as did all the social sciences, considered by the new communist authorities to be dangerous for the “new” man and the society. The purpose of this article is an attempt to describe the situation of social pedagogy in Poland at the beginning of introduction of political, economic and social changes inspired by the ideology of communism in the so-called Stalinist period, i.e. between 1945 and 1956, with reference to the two currents in which it functioned at that time – one focused around the person and the concept of Helena Radlińska and one created on the borderline of pedagogy and social teaching of the Catholic Church.

Frühneuzeitliche Bildungsmigration von Kindern und Jugendlichen aus Böhmen und Mähren im 16. und frühen 17. Jahrhundert

Journeys Undertaken by Children and Adolescents from Bohemia and Moravia to Attain Education in the 16th and Early 17th Century The presented synoptic study focuses on the question of the educational migration of children and adolescents in the early modern Czech state. Based on analysis of a variety of sources together with the results of previous research, the study looks at the gender, age, nationality, and social composition of these individuals as well as a number of other aspects of this topic, such as what institutions and regions children and adolescents set out for in order to seek education, what type of education they might have received, how such journeys were organized and paid for and how these nonadults viewed them, etc. Set within the broader context of the cultural, religious, and educational history of the early modern period, the study examines not only peregrination to attain university education but also the journeys undertaken in search of preuniversity education. Furthermore, the paper attempts to trace key developmental trends and, in closing, suggests areas for continued research on this topic.

Educating the New Soviet Man: Propagated Image and Hidden Resistance in Soviet Latvia

The New Soviet Man has been studied primarily from the perspective of its creators, propagators of Communist ideology, while the recipients of the New Soviet Man project and its immediate end users, namely pupils and teachers were largely ignored. Hence, the present research, while capturing and utilizing the experience of Soviet Latvia from 1945 to 1985, sets the research questions as to how the image of the New Soviet Man was presented and introduced at schools and how the concept of the New Soviet Man was perceived and utilised by the “objects” of this state contract – teachers and pupils. The research corpus includes 26 textbooks, 265 school photos and 367 student profile records. For the research purposes, four discursive domains of the New Soviet Man project were identified, namely, socio-biological discourse (gender, body, sexuality and health); social discourse (social class); spatial discourse (nationality) and discourse of individuality (personality, character traits). Given that the dictatorship unavoidably engenders the conflict of interests and resistance, the research corpus allowed to detect some tiny openings for the oppressed to express their views, some elements of pupils’ and teachers’ subtle resistance to the creation of the New Soviet Man, by using horizontal solidarity, avoidance, and slipping into the Grey Zone.

Teaching of Marxism-Leninism in Czechoslovakia 1948–1989

The article deals with one of the key tools of forming a socialist-minded intelligentsia at universities, the teaching of Marxism-Leninism. The author summarizes results of her research in which she focused, apart from a factual account, also on constituent actors and their mutual interactions. On the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and the objectives it had in the beginning of the project and which it was pursuing and adjusting for decades afterwards. On teachers of Marxism-Leninism, who kept the project going and were also looking for some space for their own concepts in it, and naturally also on students’ attitudes and approaches to the teaching of Marxism-Leninism.