Prerequisits:

None required.

Content (Syllabus outline):

This course discusses the basic theoretical and methodological tools for studying the relations between emerging national literatures, cultural nationalisms, and national political movements. The emphasis is on central and southeast Europe from the mid-eighteenth-century expansion of Enlightenment ideas to the end of the “long” nineteenth century (until the First World War). The central role in the national movements that spread across Europe like an epidemic (often as part of multinational political entities) was assumed by language and literature. The main social systems that developed and spread new ideas are presented, including the Enlightenment-era Republic of Letters. Within the institutional and political contexts, the typical tendencies of this period are discussed, such as the interest in language and folk music, publishing old texts, historiography and literary history, customs and mythology, writing national art music, patriotic poetry, and historical prose, and holding commemorations and festivals. Special attention is dedicated to the role of literary discourse in these processes and to the canonization of “cultural saints,” especially national poets.

Readings:

• Anderson, Benedict. Zamišljene skupnosti: o izvoru in širjenju nacionalizma. Prev. Alja Brglez Uranjek in Andrej Kurillo, spremna beseda Jože Vogrinc. Nova, razširjena izd. Ljubljana: Studia humanitatis, 2007.
• Dović, Marijan. Kulturni nacionalizem, literatura in Enciklopedija romantičnega nacionalizma v Evropi. Krakar Vogel, Boža (ur.) Slavistika v regijah: Nova Gorica. Ljubljana: Slavistično društvo Slovenije, 2013. 38–44.
• Even-Zohar, Itamar. The Role of Literature in the Making of the Nations of Europe. Applied Semiotics/Sémiotique appliquée 1.1 (1996): 39–59.
• Goodman, Dena. The Republic of Letters: A Cultural History of the French Enlightenment. Ithaca: Cornell UP.
• Helgason, Jón Karl. The Role of Cultural Saints in European Nation States. Sela-Sheffy, Rakefet, Gideon Toury, eds. Culture Contacts and the Making of Cultures. Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv University, 2011. 245-254.
• Hobsbawm, Eric J. Nacije in nacionalizem po letu 1780: program, mit in resničnost. Prevedla Katarina Rotar. Ljubljana: Založba /*cf., 2007.
• Hroch, Miroslav. From National Movement to the Fully-formed Nation. The Nation Building Process in Europe. New Left Review I/198 (1993): 3-20.
• Juvan, Marko. Prešernovska struktura in svetovni literarni sistem. Ljubljana: LUD Literatura, 2012.
• Leerssen, Joep. National Thought in Europe. A Cultural History. Amsterdam: Amsterdam UP, 2006.
• Leerssen, Joep. Nationalism and the cultivation of culture. Nations and Nationalism 12.4 (2006): 559–578.
• Neubauer, John. Figures of National Poets. Introduction. History of the Literary Cultures of East-Central Europe. Junctures and Disjunctures in the 19th and 20th Centuries. (Vol. 4.) Ed. by Marcel Cornis-Pope and John Neubauer. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2010. 11–18.
• Quinault, Roland. The Cult of the Centenary, c. 1784–1914. Historical Research 71.176 (1998): 303-323.
• Vidmar, Luka. Zoisova literarna republika. Vloga pisma v narodnih prerodih Slovencev in Slovanov. Ljubljana: ZRC, 2010.

Objectives and competences:

Students familiarize themselves with the research tools for studying the relations between European literary cultures and national movements. In the process, they are introduced to relevant Slovenian and international study literature: theoretical literature, especially general theories of nationalism and cultural nationalism, and interdisciplinary and transnational historical studies, such as Encyclopedia of Romantic Nationalism in Europe, which is required to conduct this type of research. In addition, through their work on term papers as part of the seminar they actively prepare themselves to conduct independent research in this area.

Intended learning outcomes:

Students use the knowledge acquired in the course to write a piece of academic writing that can serve as a draft of a dissertation chapter or a research article.

Learning and teaching methods:

Types of learning/teaching:

• Frontal teaching
• Work in smaller groups or pair work
• Independent students work
• e-learning

Teaching methods:

• Explanation
• Conversation/discussion/debate
• Work with texts

Assessment:

• 70 % Long written assignments,
• 20 % Presentations
• 10 % Active participation in lectures and seminars.