Im Schatten der Fahnen

Kleinstädtische Lebenswelt in Vyšší Brod/Hohenfurth 1918–1937

Abstract

The article deals with the national and ethnic situation in the small south-Bohemian town of Vyšší Brod. According to the requirements of micro history, the study tries – within the field of social history – to get the closest possible access to individual and collective interpretations and evaluations. Within the framework of the structures of the environment, this approach attempts to trace the experiences that the citizens hold as ‘true’ in their social complexity in order to characterise the effect of the interventions coming from ‘outside’ and the disruptions within the social environment of a small town. The exploration of economic interdependencies and social group-building is regarded as being essential for the lifeworld constructs of the actors. Interviews with eye-witnesses provide insight in the complex ways the imaginary notion of the ‘nation’ was expressed in everyday life. The knowledge of the economic, social and political problems between the two World Wars is a means to understand the brutal realisation of the idea of national homogenisation under the Nazi rule between 1938 and 1945.