Kidnapped Souls
Throughout the nineteenth and into the early decades of the twentieth century, it was common for rural and working-class parents in the Czech-German borderlands to ensure that their children were…
Specifikacia Kidnapped Souls
Throughout the nineteenth and into the early decades of the twentieth century, it was common for rural and working-class parents in the Czech-German borderlands to ensure that their children were bilingual by sending them to live with families who spoke the other language. As nationalism became a more potent force in Central Europe, however, such practices troubled pro-German and pro-Czech activists, who feared that the children born to their nation could literally be lost or kidnapped from the national community through such experiences and, more generally, by parents who were either flexible about national belonging or altogether indifferent to it.Highlighting this indifference to nationalism--and concerns about such apathy among nationalists--Kidnapped Souls offers a surprising new perspective on Central European politics and society in the first half of the