Annotation
This one-semester course is offered mainly to foreign students in the framework of TEMA program, ERASMUS students and to MA students of the Seminar of General and Comparative history. The course will focus on places and cultural institutions in Prague, their rich history and high symbolical meaning. By visiting of Prague monuments, museums, galleries, etc. and discussing not only their history, but also their influence of the present, will be explained the role, these symbolical places and cultural institutions played in Czech and European culture. In each class we will visit one of these cultural institutions and discuss their importance for Czech and European history and culture.
Thematical topics:
Monasteries as first the centers of culture
High Gothic in the Czech lands
History of Charles University
Reformation in Czech lands
Czech baroque architecture
Czech folk culture
Czech national revival
Panslavism and its influence in Czech culture
Technical inventions in the 19th and 20th century
Pantheon of famous Czechs
Art Nouveau in Prague
Czech Legions in WWI and WWII
German occupation of Czechoslovakia and Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia during the WWII