Show simple item record

Files in this item

Item metadata

dc.contributor.authorKamusella, Tomasz Dominik
dc.date.accessioned2013-02-08T15:31:01Z
dc.date.available2013-02-08T15:31:01Z
dc.date.issued2012
dc.identifier.citationKamusella , T D 2012 , ' Scripts and politics in modern Central Europe ' , Mitteilungen der Österreichischen Geographischen Gesellschaft , vol. 154 , 1 , pp. 9-42 . https://doi.org/10.1553/moeg154s9en
dc.identifier.issn0029-9138
dc.identifier.otherPURE: 45163793
dc.identifier.otherPURE UUID: c63a0301-c14e-4682-aa0a-aba6ffd807f8
dc.identifier.otherScopus: 84874857271
dc.identifier.otherORCID: /0000-0003-3484-8352/work/42102738
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10023/3346
dc.description.abstractAt present two scripts are employed in Central Europe, Latin and Cyrillic, or three,if we include Greece in the region. In this article I set out to problematise this oversimplisticpicture drawing at examples from the past and pointing to various politicaland identificational uses of scripts today. Until the mid-20th century, also other scripts(and different types of the Latin and Cyrillic script, for that matter) were used forofficial purposes and in book production, namely Arabic, Armenian, Church Cyrillic,Gothic and Hebrew. In addition, Glagolitic and Runes (both Nordic and Hungarian)were sometimes recalled for ideological reasons. Each of these scripts was used forwriting in numerous languages. Initially, script choices were dictated by religion(Latin letters for Western Christianity, Church Cyrillic for Slavophone OrthodoxChristians, or the Arabic writing system for Muslims), usually connected to a holybook in an ecclesiastical language committed to parchment in a specific script. Whenvernaculars began to make an appearance in writing, especially in the 16th centuryand later, their users stuck to the scripts of their holy books. Two factors, the processof building ethnolinguistically defined nation-states and changing ideas about whatmodernity should be about in the sphere of culture, radically limited the number ofscripts in official and de facto use. Only in Bosnia-Hercegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia,Moldova, Montenegro and Ukraine are two scripts in official use, to varying degrees inthe different countries. The European Union already uses three official scripts, Cyrillic,Greek and Latin; if its actions follow its words and it admits some or all of thesestates to membership, it stands a good chance of reviving the tradition of Europeanmultiscripturality, alongside its legally enshrined commitment to multilingualism.
dc.language.isoeng
dc.relation.ispartofMitteilungen der Österreichischen Geographischen Gesellschaften
dc.subjectScriptsen
dc.subjectPoliticsen
dc.subjectWritingen
dc.subjectLiteracyen
dc.subjectLanguage politicsen
dc.subjectCentral Europeen
dc.subjectPG Slavic, Baltic, Albanian languages and literatureen
dc.subject.lccPGen
dc.titleScripts and politics in modern Central Europeen
dc.typeJournal articleen
dc.description.versionPostprinten
dc.contributor.institutionUniversity of St Andrews. School of Historyen
dc.identifier.doihttps://doi.org/10.1553/moeg154s9
dc.description.statusPeer revieweden
dc.identifier.urlhttp://hw.oeaw.ac.at/?arp=0x002d997aen


This item appears in the following Collection(s)

Show simple item record