De grenzen van het woord: over tijdschriften, dissidenten en de Europese culturele ruimte

Abstract

Emigre journals in Cold War Europe have long been considered isolated islands of Central and East European communities with limited relevance. In the second half of the Cold War some of these journals functioned as crucial intersections of communication between dissidents, emigrants and West-European intellectuals. They were the greenhouses for the development of new definitions of Central Europe, Eastern Europe and Europe at large. This article studies Cold War emigre journals from a spatial perspective and argues that they can be analysed as European cultural spaces. In this approach European cultural spaces are insular components of a European public sphere. The particular settings (spaces) within which the journals developed have contributed greatly to the ideas that were expressed in the journals. The specific limits and functions of journals such as Kultura or Svědectvi have triggered perceptions of Central European and European solidarity. The originally Russian journal Kontinent promoted eventually less successful East European-Russian solidarity.