RE-EMERGENCE OF THE LANGUAGE OF HISTORY IN POST-SOCIALIST SLOVAKIA. ON THE CONCEPT OF HISTORICAL DEMOCRATIC IMAGINATION AFTER 1989

• Authors: Ivančík Matej
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

Shortly after the democratic revolution of 1989 it seemed that history ended and the emerging democratic order would focus on future. However, the conceptualization of the language of history and subsequent transformation of it into deliberate policies appeared as crucial within discourses of legitimacy. In this article, I will argue that liberal-democratic milieu, politicians, writers, historians and more broadly intellectuals, were actively contributing to debates on history, historiography and/or philosophy of history instead. In doing so, they constituted a key component of the post-socialist democracy-building. The case of the post-socialist Slovakia is instrumental in shedding the light on viability of such imaginary as it had to be in communication with the growing nationalism that eventually lead to Czechoslovakia’s dissolution in 1993. I examine the variety of intellectual accounts through the analytical tool of the “historical democratic imagination”. While it built on the thought originating in the 1960s debates, I put emphasis on its adjustments and meaning-making through the post-socialist situation. Although, the liberal-democratic milieu did not adopt it and eventually gave way to a more politically utilizable condemnation of nationalism, I would argue the “historical democratic imagination” was a key element of “thinking post-socialist democracy” in Slovakia after the 1989 revolution.

Keywords

EN

LIBERAL DEMOCRACY; PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY; HISTORY; HISTORIOGRAPHY; NATIONALISM; POST-DISSENT; POST-SOCIALISM; SLOVAKIA

• Publisher: Institute of History of the Slovak Academy of Sciences
• Journal: Historický časopis (Historical Journal)
• Year: 2024
• Volume: 72
• Issue: 5
• Pages: 925 - 946

Contributors

author

Ivančík Matej

• Katedra všeobecných dejín, FiF UK Bratislava, Gondova 2, 811 02 Bratislava, Slovak Republic

• https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1472-9500

Identifiers

DOI

https://doi.org/10.31577/histcaso.2024.72.5.4