Tomasz Kamusella. Words in Space and Time: Historical Atlas of Language Politics in Modern Central Europe

Abstract

It is quite common to accept the contemporary world as a world of nations. But there is no equal approach to the nature of nations, their historical longitude or historical perspective, their main constructing factors (if recognized), or even their place of origin as a paradigm for spreading all over the world. B. Anderson, E. Smith, M. Hroch, and many other scientists are holding endless virtual discussions on these topics, paying special attention to language or the linguistic question. And in these circumstances, when theory is most eager for the factual side of historical development, the appearance of such books as T. Kamusella’s seems to be of high significance.This book, according to the author (p. xi), was inspired mainly by “Paul Robert Magocsi’s Historical Atlas of (East) Central Europe (1992, 2003, 2019)” and is an addition to the author’s previous work (The Politics of Language and Nationalism in Modern Central Europe [Houndmills, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009]). The main conceptional and geographical meaning in the book belongs to the term “modern Central Europe.” According to T. Kamusella, “From the thematic perspective of this atlas . . . Central Europe is defined as this part of Europe where, after 1918, the model of ethnolinguistic nation-state has been dominant for the sake of statehood creation, legitimation, and maintenance in accordance with ethnolinguistic nationalism’s principle of the normative isomorphism of language, nation, and state. In the terms of borders and polities after the end of communism and the breakup of the Soviet Union, Central Europe extends from Italy and Germany in the west to Russia’s western frontier, and from Scandinavia to the Balkans, including Turkey (that is, Anatolia)” (p. 180). Among other important categories mentioned by the author, languages (Einzelsprachen) can be named as actualizations of the biological capacity for speech (Sprache) and as part of culture (p. xv); he underlines that “during the past two centuries,” this concept “has been a highly politicized category of thinking about politics and societies in Central Europe” (p. 5), the dialect continua (p. 7), and so forth.The subject of the book is not only the areas of language and writing systems and their changes through politics in history but also a lot of other topics, such as multiethnic regions; ethnic cleansing in the twentieth century; isomorphism (showed for certain periods) in language situations, nations, and states in the Central Europe region; and isomorphism between Central Europe and East and Southeast Asia.The main part of the book consists of maps and texts related to these topics (in forty-three chapters). Of great significance, the Glossary (pp. 167–229) defines related terms. It is especially valuable because of the author’s thorough analysis of the meanings of the terms or concepts and, if needed, their evolution and the public and political usage of them. Among these terms, there are those related to social, religious, geographical, national, historical, legal, and linguistic areas. A thorough Bibliography (pp. 231–250) follows the Glossary, providing important background for each of the chapters.According to the Acknowledgments, this book is the outcome of the author’s hard work over many years and the work of the many people who helped him in different professional ways. Some parts of the book, as T. Kamusella points out, were written by other authors who majored in the proper fields of study. For example, the maps were made professionally by cartographer Robert Chmielewski (p. xii); Chapter 40, “Roma Settlements in Central Europe, 2009,” was written by E. Marushiakova and V. Popov; and the Index was created by John Puckett.It is noticeable that along with Paul Robert Magosci’s influence, the book was also inspired by the author’s experiences in his life and scientific activities. The system of the author’s arguments, fortified by his fostered postulates in “Introduction: Languages and I,” could be referred to as utterly emotional. Perhaps it’s the author’s trick to keep the audience’s attention by providing the opportunity to view the issues through his personal lens. It is worth mentioning that the topic of Silesian language unrecognized officially as a language in Poland (p. 2) in the author’s description of his personal language and communication experience is given further development in one of the chapters of his book (Chapter 41).This book is also a manifestation of the new era of the revision of scientific tools, including terms that appeared in a certain period of science development and became too tight for the contemporary world. This world is characterized by the author as featuring a variety of historical, ethnic, and linguistic phenomena and as full of misunderstanding of contemporary or historical past reality. For instance, he points out that “Central Europe is as much imagined as Europe itself, and these concepts, as any others developed by humans, are part of social reality” (p. 180).Touching on questions of a theoretical character, which are of high necessity, the author clashes with classic meanings and approaches relating to ethnolinguistic nationalism. He maintains, using the maps, that “neither languages nor ethnic groups (nations) are ‘naturally’ (or ‘divinely destined’ to be) coupled together and contained within a single nation-state. This way of constructing and maintaining national statehood is rather unusual from the global perspective, and is primarily confined to Central Europe (alongside Southeast and East Asia)” (p. 7).Every map is accompanied by the author’s text. This text not only plays a service role but also contains very rich factual and conceptional material. The author begins his narrative in the ninth century, characterizing it as a period in Europe when four main holy languages coexisted and determined the areas of spreading literacy groups in the European population. He also mentions peoples and social groups that used the languages not of holy character, such as so-called Varangian. Church history, trade occupations, and political changes are shown as the main factors causing the changes in the map of languages. For the author, each new period emerges as the result of these influences, plus new factors affecting the change process. Using historical examples, the author points out the fact that crucial political changes are not necessarily accompanied by the same crucial changes in language usage (p. 23).As one of the important features of the book and even a new theme for traditional European historiography, T. Kamusella considers the special attention to the Indic-speaking Roma (p. 25).Some questions, in my view, are still under discussion, and I cannot completely agree with the author’s position in some areas. For instance, in his depiction of Slavic state development, T. Kamusella gives the exclusive main role to external factors presented by “Germanic-speaking Norsemen” (p. 8).As to the formal features of the book (eBook), it would be much better if the maps were numbered in their descriptions or titles—especially because the author refers to the maps by number in the text.This review is very much needed, inspiring, and full of new ideas for investigation; it should be a handbook for everyone who is interested in language as a part of cultural, intellectual, national, and/or state history and also in comprehensive and not politically engaged studies.