CONTENTS - NUMBER 2, DECEMBER 1998

A r t i c l e s

KELEMEN, Jozef: A View of Rationality at the End of the Modern Age...101
KOSTOLANSKÝ, Eduard: On the Corpus of Literary Works...112
FRANEK, Ladislav: An Essay on the Modernism of Octavio Paz...121
SICH, Alexander I.: Some Remarks on Questions of Teaching of History in the Present Times...137
DUPKALA, Rudolf - VIŠŇOVSKÝ, Emil: On the Development and Character of Slovak Philosophy I....147
KRUPA, Victor - ONDREJKOVIČ, Slavomír: Is Linguistic Legislation Acceptable?...161
DEÁK, Ladislav: The Vienna Arbitration in the Light of International Law and the Facts...170
TUŠEK, Andrej: The European Character of the Slovak Regional and Local Press (Part Two)...182
DANGLOVÁ, Oľga: The Phenomenon of Poverty in the Slovak Countryside...193

Back > >

A VIEW OF RATIONALITY AT THE END OF THE MODERN AGE

Jozef Kelemen
Department of Applied Informatics, University of Economics, 852 35 Bratislava, Slovakia and
Institute of Computer Science, Silesian University, 746 01 Opava, Czechia

Rationality has accompanied people since they have set out on their journey through history. Every age perceives the route in a different way and attaches a different importance to it. The following lines are an attempt at introducing one of the possible views of rationality in the modern age, the age we have lived in since the advent of rationalism. It will concern specific views of rationality dictated by the struggles for formally correct accounts of what we observe in human actions and in organized communities, economic units in particular, and the struggles for technical reconstruction of rational systems we meet in the area of advanced technologies, for example in artificial intelligence and robotics. I will ultimately try to find connections between these modern approaches to rationality and the possible understanding of rationality in the period, the character of which is discussed within the framework of postmodernism and which will come only after the modern age has been internally exhausted.
pp. 101-111

Download full text in PDF format

ON THE CORPUS OF LITERARY WORKS

Eduard Kostolanský
Department of Applied Mathematics and Computer Science, Faculty of Natural Science, University of Sts Cyrill and Methodius, Nám. J. Herdu 2, 917 01 Trnava, Slovakia

Information technology (IT) penetrates into all areas of human activity. The automated analysis of literary texts aimed at problem identification and problem solving in these texts is a unique challenge to IT. The success of IT in the analysis of the works of art would confirm IT to be a breakthrough in technology also in the direction of the integration of natural, technical, and artistic knowledge and their optimum use in the evolution of society. The complexity of computer modelling of literary texts and the demand for the formation of extensive corpora require concentrated efforts which might be coordinated, for example, by UNESCO.
pp. 112-120

Download full text in PDF format

AN ESSAY ON THE MODERNISM OF OCTAVIO PAZ

Ladislav Franek
Institute of World Literature, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Konventná 13, 813 64 Bratislava
and Department of Romance Languages, Faculty of Arts, Comenius University, Gondova 2, 818 01 Bratislava, Slovakia

The article analyses an important essay by O. Paz `The Labyrinth of Solitude' from several points of view - moral, philosophical-historical or cultural-anthropological. The author uses the notion of national identity for a wider explanation of mythological and universal interpretation of human existence which enables Paz "to become someone else within one's own self" on a psychoanalytical basis. In this sense he observes especially his bonds with German Romantic poetry and philosophy (Hegel, Goethe, etc.). As he points out, from a literary point of view it is important that Paz goes beyond formalist and structuralist principles towards catching individual signs of the spiritual culture of nations (cf. his book `Shadows of Works', 1996). To a considerable extent it enables us to fruitfully connect determinism with dialectics, scholarly view with the poetic view one whereby, he also fulfils a deeper methodological framework of the term historical poetics.
pp. 121-136

Download full text in PDF format

SOME REMARKS ON QUESTIONS OF TEACHING OF HISTORY IN THE PRESENT TIMES

Alexander I. Sich
Faculty of History, J. Fedkovich State University, Kotsiubinsky Street, 273032 Chernivtsy, Ukraine

The author states that there is a radical transformation going on in the national historiography. He also states that some historians inadequately call this transformation period as critical. According to him, the reputation of the historians' profession is in crisis. Teaching of history is not about telling fortunes, it is about encouraging man to think, about education of the spirit, and about the formation of a citizen's opinion of things. If this is true, then history will help us to have a better life, to be more tolerant, and to understand other people.
pp. 137-146

Download full text in PDF format

ON THE DEVELOPMENT AND CHARACTER OF SLOVAK PHILOSOPHY I. (From early times to the nineteenth century)

Rudolf Dupkala
Department of Philosophy, Faculty of Arts, Prešov University, 17. novembra 1, 080 78 Prešov, Slovakia
Emil Višňovský
Department of Social and Biological Communication, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Dúbravská cesta 9, 813 64 Bratislava, Slovakia

An overview of the main features of the development and the character of Slovak philosophy from early times to the nineteenth century is provided. The authors stress the European and Christian cultural context of Slovak philosophical thought. The development of culture in the territory of what is today Slovakia gives safe evidence of the tradition of philosophy existing there. Slovak philosophers have always had knowledge of and scholarship in Western philosophy which they not only accepted but also interpreted in their own way and used for their own purposes.
pp. 147-160

Download full text in PDF format

IS LINGUISTIC LEGISLATION ACCEPTABLE?

Viktor Krupa
Institute of Oriental and African Studies, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Klemensova 19, 813 64 Bratislava, Slovakia
Slavomír Ondrejovič
Ľudovít Štúr Linguistics Institute, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Panská 26, 813 64 Bratislava, Slovakia

This article is a reaction to the paper published by a team of Hungarian linguists concerning the Slovak language law. In the opinion of V. Krupa and S. Ondrejovič language planning and language policy can and often is influenced not only by explicit legal means but also by implicit and much less transparent measures. The latter may sometimes cause more serious difficulties to linguistic (or ethnic) minorities than explicit laws that are much easier to criticize. When judging language laws, one has to take into account not only their wording but also their implementation in everyday life.
pp. 161-169

Download full text in PDF format

THE VIENNA ARBITRATION IN THE LIGHT OF INTERNATIONAL LAW AND THE FACTS

Ladislav Deák
Institute of Historical Studies, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Klemensova 19, 813 64 Bratislava, Slovakia

The events which led to the arbitration verdict of Germany and Italy in Vienna on November 2, 1938 are elucidated on the basis of domestic and foreign sources. By this verdict Czecho-Slovakia had to cede part of its territory to Hungary. The author concentrated on the shaping of the Magyar revisionist policy, its particular manifestations in 1938 and the cooperation of Hungary, Germany, Italy, and Poland with respect to the Czecho-Slovak Republic. On the basis of the conclusions of the Munich Agreement, the author points to the strategy of Hungary in the enforcement of territorial demands during negotiations with Czecho-Slovakia in October 1938 and its share in the preparation of the Vienna verdict. The Vienna arbitration is studied from the perspective of both the solving of the minority issue between the two countries and the Diktat of Munich, of which the Vienna verdict was part and a direct consequence.
pp. 170-181

Download full text in PDF format

THE EUROPEAN CHARACTER OF THE SLOVAK REGIONAL AND LOCAL PRESS (PART TWO)

Andrej Tušer
Department of Journalism, Faculty of Arts, Comenius University, Štúrova 9, 811 02 Bratislava, Slovakia

The second part of the study analyses the development of individual subsystems of the press (regional, district, town, and company). The regional and local press is estimated within the context of the structural changes in Czechoslovak society after World War II during the past more than 50 years. Special emphasis is laid on the period after November 1989, when the publication of the means of mass communication, their content and typology changed substantially. Attention is also devoted to the situation after the introduction of the new territorial division of Slovakia in 1996.
pp. 182-191

Download full text in PDF format

THE PHENOMENON OF POVERTY IN THE SLOVAK COUNTRYSIDE

Olga Danglová
Institute of Ethnology, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Jakubovo nám. 12, 813 64 Bratislava, Slovakia

The social and economic transformation in the post-socialist countries including Slovakia has brought the legitimization of poverty. The paper deals with poverty in the agrarian milieu of southern Slovakia and with the manifestation of poverty in material and social deprivation. The author has tried to find an answer to the question whether it is caused by external factors - shortcomings of the social and economic system, whether it is individually conditioned or, finally, the consequence of both kinds of factors.
pp. 193-200

Download full text in PDF format

EUROPE | SLOVAKIA | BRATISLAVA

© Department of Social & Biological Communication Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava
Electronic version is available via Internet and GSM: www.humanaffairs.sk, wap.humanaffairs.sk
Reg. No. 648/92

MADE IN SLOVAKIA