Cleansing The Czechoslovak Borderlands: Migration, Environment, And Health In The Former Sudetenland (Russian And East European Studies)

In this innovative study of the aftermath of ethnic cleansing, Eagle Glassheim examines the transformation of CzechoslovakiaÆs Sudetenland from the end of the Second World War, through the Cold War, and into the twenty-first century. Prior to their expulsion in 1945, ethnic Germans had inhabited the Sudeten borderlands for hundreds of years, with deeply rooted local cultures and close, if sometimes tense, ties with BohemiaÆs Czech majority. Cynically, if largely willingly, harnessed by Hitler in 1938 to his pursuit of a Greater Germany, the SudetenlandÆs three million Germans became the focus of Czech authorities in their retributive efforts to remove an alien ethnic element from the body politicùand claim the spoils of this coal-rich, industrialized area. Yet, as Glassheim reveals, socialist efforts to create a modern utopia in the newly resettled ôfrontierö territories proved exceedingly difficult. Many borderland regions remained sparsely populated, peppered with dilapidated and abandoned houses, and hobbled by decaying infrastructure. In the more densely populated northern districts, coalmines, chemical works, and power plants scarred the land and spewed toxic gases into the air. What once was a diverse religious, cultural, economic, and linguistic ôcontact zone,ö became, according to many observers, a scarred wasteland, both physically and psychologically. Glassheim offers new perspectives on the struggles of reclaiming ethnically cleansed lands in light of utopian dreams and dystopian realitiesùbrought on by the uprooting of cultures, the loss of communities, and the industrial degradation of a once-thriving region. To Glassheim, the lessons drawn from the Sudetenland speak to the deep social traumas and environmental pathologies wrought by both ethnic cleansing and state-sponsored modernization processes that accelerated across Europe as a result of the great wars of the twentieth century.

• | Author: Eagle Glassheim
• | Publisher: University Of Pittsburgh Press
• | Publication Date: Nov 18, 2016
• | Number of Pages: 288 pages
• | Language: English
• | Binding: Paperback/History
• | ISBN-10: 0822964260
• | ISBN-13: 9780822964261