Courses - January Term 2021
Classes are taught Monday through Friday for 4 hours per day a total of 45 hours. Choose one course from those listed below.
ART 304 (3) | Music Between a Universal Language and Local Culture
ART 403 (3) | Czech Folklore and Popular Culture
The course presents introduction to vernacular layer of culture of the Czech lands: folklore, collective mythology, traditional rituals, everyday customs, and popular culture in general.
Firstly, we introduce a range of theoretical approaches to study Czech folklore and popular culture, exploring the intersection between oral and literary tradition, social and local memory, popular entertainments, and broader political and historical contexts within the East and Central Europe. We will briefly analyse history of discussions on Czech folklore, starting with the High Middle Ages and Bohemian Reformation (folktales and exempla), followed by Humanism (historical and local legends and proverbs), the Enlightenment (folk beliefs and local legends), Romantism and Romantic Nationalism (folk songs and folk poetry) and Art Nouveau (folk art and material culture), concluding with foundation of serious academic interest in folklore in the end of the 19th century.
Secondly, building on knowledge of these conceptual approaches and popular genres, we will examine several examples of political uses and misuses of Czech folklore and popular culture during the 20th and 21st centuries by various political (and also seemingly apolitical) ideologies such as Czech and German nationalisms, Czech Marxism, state socialism, and neoliberalism.
During final part of the course, we will try to interpret possible pecularities and/or cultural specifics of Czech folklore and popular culture – with special attention devoted not only to traditional folktales and legends, but also more contemporary folkloric genres: urban legends, jokes, graffiti, and memes.
Integral part of the course will be several short guided walks to specific sites connected with Czech folklore and popular culture (e. g. visit to the Ethnographic Museum in Prague) and screening of a movie which interprets Czech vernacular culture.