2023-12-25 14:55:20
Written by ER
Another Hungary yearbook edited by the Hungarian Institute at the University of Regensburg has been published.
The current volume 38 of the Hungary Yearbook once again brings together a broad and interesting spectrum of topics from Hungarian history, ranging from the Middle Ages to the present.
The Reich German School in Budapest
The treatises shed light on rather unknown special topics for experts, such as Johann Falbrecht and David Rosenfeld in the financial administration of medieval Hungary (Renata Skorka – Boglárka Weisz), The treasury at Forchtenstein Castle – as it was built by Pál Esterházy (Erika Kiss), The Reich German School in Budapest between the two world wars (László Orosz), marriage mobility in southern Transdanubia. Regional endogamy in Vajszló and its surroundings (1750–1949) (Gábor Koloh) or The three pillars of anti-rural politics in Hungary 1959–1971 (Gergely Krisztián Horváth).
Protestant Transylvania
This volume of the yearbook also includes topics that are particularly interesting for a broad audience, some of which deal with minority political and nationality-historical developments or events. One of the most important elements for the construction, preservation and cohesion of a minority group was undoubtedly religion and, related to it, religious tolerance.
The development of Transylvania would certainly have been completely different without the spread of Protestantism, and the coexistence of the peoples living there would certainly have been different if there had not been religious tolerance in pluriconfessional Transylvania 1542–1571 (Hans Christian Jensen). Later, from the 19th century onwards, religious tolerance no longer played the greatest role in the coexistence of nations and nationalities, but rather national, cultural affiliation and, associated with it, the striving for independence and statehood.
An example of this is the Memorandum Movement, which advocated for Romanian interests and cultural unity using what today would be described as an international marketing campaign. Leo Stauber draws this strategy and the Hungarian reactions to it from different perspectives in the article The Transylvanian Memorandum Movement from the perspective of Romanian, Hungarian and German nationalism.
Minority politics
Among other things, the national question led to the breakup of the Habsburg Monarchy, but the territorial changes in the Danube-Carpathian region were unable to solve the minority question, but rather shifted it and changed its form. Not even Hungary, which had to cede extensive territories under the Treaty of Trianon, became a nation state without minorities, so Hungary also had to pursue a minority policy afterwards.
The article Hungary’s nationality policy from 1918 to 1990 (Ferenc Eiler) is dedicated to the development of this political field up to the beginning of democratization. The article The Trianon Peace Treaty and Hungarian society in the early 1920s (Dávid Ligeti) illuminates the beginning of this period after the peace treaty and thus embeds the minority political issue in a socio-political development framework, so that a good picture of this era emerges.
60 years of the Hungarian Institute Munich
However, the clear – and also worth emphasizing – focus of this Hungary yearbook is the 60th birthday of the Hungarian Institute Munich (UIM). To mark this occasion, the UIM organized a public conference in Regensburg on November 25, 2022, with which it wanted to make not only its history, but also its future and its plans accessible to a broad public, promote it and activate colleagues.
The symposium lectures were given by UIM staff and colleagues and edited for publication in the yearbook. They all shed light on the topic of Hungarian studies over time, i.e. the general field of work of the UIM, from different perspectives. This in turn illustrates the broad concept of Hungarian Studies on the one hand and the content orientation of the Hungarian Institute at the University of Regensburg on the other.
These include Hungarology as a scientific research program (Zsolt K. Lengyel), Hungary’s foreign cultural policy and Hungarology since 1990 (Gábor Ujváry), minorities and minority protection. Experiences and perspectives from university teaching in Regensburg (Ralf Thomas Göllner), the minority issue in the (higher) school system in Hungary (Beáta Márkus), language and regional studies as part of the additional course of study “Hungaricum” (Krisztina Busa), language and literature in the European Hungarian Studies (Andrea Seidler), papers in the special collections of the Hungarian Institute in Munich (Bernadette Baumgartner) and Patriotica (cultural heritage) research and its significance in the 21st century (István Monok). This wide range of topics offers everyone interested in Hungary, Hungarian history, language and culture numerous new and exciting insights from different perspectives.
The volume is rounded off by an extensive review section in which 17 new publications with a connection to Hungary are discussed, as well as a report on the 60th anniversary of the Hungarian Institute in Munich, which took place in October 2022 at the Consulate General of Hungary in Munich. With this volume, the Hungarian Institute has presented another publication with numerous in-depth and important contributions to the history, culture and politics of Hungary from the Middle Ages to the present.
Hungary Yearbook 38
Verlag Friedlich Puste, 2023
bound, 48 euros
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