Abstract
This publication is an annotated collection of translations of theoretical and historical studies on the subject of literary censorship from various language areas (German, English, French, Polish and Russian). It aims to depict the substantial transformation which research into the phenomenon of censorship underwent in the humanities and social sciences over the last few decades and to refer to the options for making use of new approaches in literary historiography and elsewhere.
Individual studies examine censorship within the context of cultural anthropology, structural analysis of language and discourse, systemic literary studies and communication theory. The book reflects the thinking of representatives of ""new censorship"", the deconstructivist school of studies into the social regulations for literature and its regularization, as well as the approaches for dealing with ""new censorship"" ideas with critical detachment.
It also includes papers by leading literary and cultural historians, who combine an analysis of specific cultural material with a problem-based approach. The methodological contribution of individual studies and the social context in which they were made is detailed in the introduction to the work by Michael Wögerbauer.
The study by Pavel Janáček, Magdaléna Pokorná and Petr Šámal which concludes the book (Czech research into press and literary censorship; pp. 485-532), analyses previous research into press and literary censorship in the Czech lands.