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Articles published in Eurozine
The Bronze Nights
The failure of forced Europeanization and the birth of defensive nationalist democracy in Estonia
The EU accession process over, writes Tonis Saarts, Estonia's rightwing party politics has found a new rallying cry: the threat of Russia. [more]
The birth of the Russian-speaking minority in Estonia
The Bronze Soldier controversy in Tallinn in April 2007 was more a product of the fears of national conservative groups than an integration problem among Estonia's Russian-speaking minority, writes Martin Ehala. [more]
Counter-revolution against a counter-revolution
Eastern Europe today
In order to defend social relations before 1989 without losing face, the middle classes in former socialist countries portray the neoliberal destruction of the welfare state as the work of communists, writes G.M. Tamás. [Estonian version added] [more]
The geopolitics of memory
Russia remains a major factor in the national narratives of the post-Soviet space. But memory politics is less about the communist past than about future political and economic hegemony on the European continent. [Estonian version added] [more]
The reluctant anthropologist
An interview with Maurice Bloch
"Anti-anthropologist" Maurice Bloch talks in interview about the abuse of anthropological expertise by developmental ecologists; about the contradictions of "collective memory"; and about whether anthropologists can address "life's big questions". [more]
Literary perspectives: Estonia
Waiting for the Great Estonian Novel
While the Great Estonian Novel has yet to be written, the range of fiction in Estonia is sufficiently wide to serve as an indicator of the post-communist country's hopes and fears, anxieties and obsessions. [German and Lithuanian versions added] [more]
Anyone at home?
In pursuit of one's own shadow
Zinovy Zinik traces the history of the shadow as metaphor for exile through Evgeni Shwartz's play "The Shadow" back to earlier fables by Hans Christian Andersen and Adelbert von Chamisso. The sum effect: a web of émigré biographies and fictions spanning two centuries. [Estonian version added] [more]
Incompatible memories?
The commemoration of WWII in France and Estonia
It is Estonia's commmunist past that distinguishes its commemoration of the Second World War from the French. Reconciliation of conflicting outlooks is possible among historians but remains wishful thinking in wider public opinion. [more]
Historicizing the traces of memory
François Dosse warns of the dangers of exaggerated commemorative events, contrasting them with the patient "work of memory". The ideas of Paul Ricoeur serve as a reminder of the historian's duties in the wider context of practical human activity. [more]
Politics of memory
The commemoration of the Franco-Prussian War, the Second World War, and the Algerian War are examples of how the nationalist construal of the past has given way to an internationalized model known as "presentism". [more]
Latvian history in the process of democratization
The Latvian example shows that the existence of competing interpretations of the past and debates about how these should be institutionalized are core parts of a society's transformation to democracy. [more]
Post-communist literatures: A postcolonial perspective
Post-Soviet narratives share the theme of arrested development found in postcolonial rewritings of the western European Bildungsroman, says Estonian literary critic Piret Peiker. [more]
Nationhood, modernity, democracy
Manifestations of national identity in modern Europe
The authority of states is increasingly eroded by the decline of party politics and effects of globalization. In this context, articulations of ethnic identity will find ever stronger expression. [more]
Why study literature?
Literary studies in Estonia has taken a crash course in twentieth-century theory. With mixed results, says the editor of cultural journal Vikerkaar. Now literary critics should stop baffling one another with jargon and aim at a wider readership. [more]
"Ach Europa"
Questions about a European public space and ambiguities of the European project
National media prove remarkably resilient to attempts to create a European public sphere, while transatlantic communication flows continue to dominate. What does this mean for the future of the much talked-about European public sphere? [more]
Energizing the European public space
There is only one path open to meeting the challenge posed by a heterogeneous collective of nationally oriented viewers, listeners, and readers: a European public space spearheaded by already established national media. [more]
Europe loses ground
Cultural media from the perspective of the Internet
European newspapers must finally pay attention to the power of the Internet. [more]
What composes a people's memory?
Estonia is in bad need of thinking about its national identity, says Jean-Pierre Minaudier. It draws solely upon its rural, "purely" Estonian roots and tends to blend out its German, Swedish, and communist past -- in contrast to the French memory, which integrates all its historic periods. [more]
Knowing the city
Interview with Rob Shields
Urban studies will help to shape the cities of tomorrow. [more]
Interview with Robert Darnton
From the 18th century enlightenment to the current revolution in Internet publishing. [more]
Estonian places of memory
The climax of Estonian national history: June 1919 and the battle of Wenden. [more]
An invisible wall
The hidden factor of Belarusian reality
Who is to blame for the political stagnation in Belarus? [more]
Globalization: for nature or against nature?
Jaan Kaplinski on advantages and disadvantages of globalization and his passionate commitment to rural life. [more]
Myth and philosophy
An Interview with Donald Phillip Verene
Donald Verene on the necessity of philosophy as a means to self-understanding. [more]