Upper Silesia in modern central Europe: On the significance of the non-national/ a-national in the age of nations 1

Tomasz Kamusella*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapter

Abstract

In Central Europe, in the case of Upper Silesia, which was contested by the Czech, German and Polish national movements, it is instructive briefly to examine such nationally teleological terms as employed in the three movements' respective languages. The most widespread of these terms, as translated into English, are as follow, nationally indifferent', ethnographic mass', intermediate layer', with no/uncrystallized national consciousness', or combinations thereof. A critical mass of scholarship on the non-/a-national, as produced by researchers focusing on Bohemia and some other lands of former Austria-Hungary, resulted in the recent proposal to make this phenomenon of the non-/a-national the subject of research in its own right. In Central and Eastern Europe theoreticians and political proponents of nationalism referred to non- and a-national groups Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels's ruins of peoples' with several favored coinages and collocations. The protracted postwar ethnic cleansing of Germans and Szlonzoks in Upper Silesia recently became the subject of A. Demshuk's monograph and Kamusella's article.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationCreating Nationality in Central Europe, 1880-1950
Subtitle of host publicationModernity, Violence and (Be) Longing in Upper Silesia
EditorsTomasz Kamusella, James Bjork, Timothy Wilson, Anna Novikov
Place of PublicationLondon
PublisherRoutledge Taylor & Francis Group
Chapter1
Pages8-52
Number of pages45
ISBN (Electronic)9781315641324
ISBN (Print)9780415835961
Publication statusPublished - 28 Apr 2016

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  • Introduction

    Kamusella, T., Wilson, T., Novikov, A. & Bjork, J., 14 Apr 2016, Creating Nationality in Central Europe, 1880-1950: Modernity, Violence and (Be) Longing in Upper Silesia. Taylor and Francis, p. 1-7 7 p.

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingForeword/postscript

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