Belgian History Research Articles

SOME SPECIFIC FEATURES OF THE GENESIS OF MODERN BELGIAN POLITICS

This article discusses the symbolism of the year 1830 in the transition from the old political order to the establishment and gradual consolidation of the modern Belgian state. Modern constitutionalism was characterized by the struggle against monarchical absolutism and the concentration of political power in the hands of a single person. In addition, it supported the respect of civil rights and liberties, the individual being at the center of liberal philosophy, along with the idea of a representative government, the separation of powers in the state and the supremacy of the rule of law. The spread of the revolutionary wave from 1830 throughout the country opened a new period in the history of Belgium, in which the ideas of centralizing the state and asserting national independence merged with the urgency to give a direction to the state by choosing the representative monarchy as a form of governance and with the introduction of the Senate as an intermediate power. By analyzing the Belgian deputies’ speeches, this article aims to make an introduction in the way the deputies imagined the construction of the state and to advance the idea of a mutual trajectory of the Belgian society in accordance with the young European nations.

Dealing with a contested past: the Belgian decolonisation debate

In recent decades, a lot of Western countries have been engaged in a heated debate on how to come to terms with their colonial past. Leaving behind the idea that colonial history consists mainly of common achievements, the former philanthropic narrative of ‘modernisation’ and ‘progress’ has been critically analysed and dissected as the awareness of its painful episodes grew. In this vein, the postcolonial history in Belgium is an interesting case to examine, as it has long been one of the most criticised colonial metropoles for the way in which it deals with its colonial past, precisely because Belgium has persisted in focusing on the positive aspect of that past. Consequently, a whole part of this history has not yet been processed and is mainly part of a contested past. Social work practices have long sought to remain neutral in this discussion, but this awareness of history as a dynamic weaving of a multiplicity of different strands of identity also applies directly to the development of social work as a profession. From a social work perspective, it is impossible to retreat into a viewpoint outside of history, as we must become aware that social work practices are deeply embedded in historical and cultural habits from which we cannot disengage. In this article, we argue that social work needs to critically deal with its own confusing history, with which it is interwoven, in order to be able to clarify what contemporary social work represents.

카이로회담 전후 연합국 군사동맹의 비판적 검토

This paper tried to critically examine the military alliance between the U.S., Britain, and China through China’s role in the Cairo talks and changes in the Allied strategy against Japan before and after the talks. Immediately after the outbreak of the Pacific War, the national government proposed a military alliance to the West, and a military alliance was signed between the United States, Britain, and China. However, each country had a different view of the Allied military alliance. As a result, the difference in strategy between the US, UK, and Chinese military leaders resulted in Burma being occupied by the Japanese military in a short period of time. Since 1943, as the war has developed in favor of the Allies on the battlefields of Europe and the Pacific, the Allies held Cairo talks for the post-war Asian initiative and the Japan-Japan strategy. Chiang Kai-shek’s participation in the Cairo conference led China to become one of the four major powers. But it was a semi-final in justification, not a real one.
 In Tehran, the Allies decided to end the war in Asia after ending the war in Europe first. Of course, the strategy agreed upon by the Allies at the Tehran talks may have been a way to quickly end World War II as a whole. However, this strategy could have a huge negative impact on Eastern Europe and Asia, even if the damage to the Chinese national government was left alone. First of all, in Europe, the Soviet Union advanced to Germany and influenced post-war Eastern Europe, and then in Northeast Asia, the Soviet Union exerted influence over Manchuria rather than other powers, which had a decisive impact on the outcome of the post-war civil war.

Experience in the fight against separatism in Belgium

Many countries in the modern world have faced with the problem of separatism, which can threaten not only the well-being of one individual state, but also the world order as a whole. Thus, it is necessary to study and use the experience of countering this phenomenon on the example of other countries, in particular, Belgium. In this country, there were social contradictions, and eventually the separatist sentiments throughout the entire period of independence. The purpose of this research is to study the methods of combating separatism in the history of Belgium and to analyze the possible use of these methods to counter separatist sentiments at the present stage of development of this country. In the course of this study, a number of methods of theoretical knowledge were used: analysis, synthesis, abstraction, concretization and generalization. As a result of the study, it was determined that different ethnic groups were formed on this territory due to the events unfolded on the territory of modern Belgium, back in the days of ancient history. In the course of the study, it was stated that after gaining independence, two mature national communities were combined in one state. The domination of Wallonia over Flanders was the cause of social contradictions. It has been determined that reaching a compromise is the main method of counteracting social protests and separatism, which manifested in many historical events. It is substantiated that the use of forceful methods of struggle was ineffective. Simultaneously with the use of method of compromise decisions, the principle of balance in the federal authorities is important for Belgium. The results made it possible to note that many decisions (although they were able to preserve the unity of Belgium) increased social contradictions between ethnic groups. This study puts into science a new perspective on the issues of combating separatism in Belgium, and also provides an analysis of how these methods affect the modernity and what variants are possible for the solution of modern problems

An Atypical Biography Concluding More Than Twenty Years of Decroly Research

This article provides, at the request of the editors of this journal, an English-language summary of a biography recently published in French about the Belgian educational pioneer Ovide Decroly, on whom we have already published a number of studies: Ovide Decroly (1871-1932): une approche atypique? (Theory and History of Education International Research Group, housed at the Faculty of Education, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada, 2022), 299 pp. (Theory and History of Education Monograph Series, vol. 4). Of that work (Depaepe, Simon & Van Gorp, 2022), which represents the conclusion of more than 20 years of research by the authors on this eminent figure in the Belgian history of education, we outline here briefly the background, methodological starting points, and contents. Keywords: Ovide Decroly, Brussels (Belgium), New Education, history of education, biography, theory, methodology and historiography of educational history and innovations

Wanneer de taalklok vijf voor twaalf slaat

The present paper seeks to shed light on the language-ideological dynamics of contemporary (1995-2018) Belgian media discourses that present multilingualism as a problem. Conceiving of the media as meaningful actors in (re)producing, recontextualising and naturalising language-ideological discourses, we analyse a corpus of 170 French- and Dutch-medium press articles containing multilingualism-as-problem orientations. Following the Discourse-Historical Approach, thematic and critical-pragmatic analyses were conducted of (1) the news topics in which multilingualism can be identified as a problem and (2) the linguistic mechanisms through which that ‘problem’ is discursively constructed. Results point to three key elements: discourses of victimhood, teleological perspectives on language justice and language history, and (false) dilemmas opposing multilingualism to the community language. These characteristics will emphasise the persistence and instrumentalisation of standard language ideology and ideals of societal monolingualism rooted in Belgian history. The article concludes with a brief reflection on the role of sociolinguistic research in engaging with language ideologies in public language debate.

Filling the bottomless pit: Financing the construction of the Royal Museums of Art and History in interwar Belgium (1919–39)

ABSTRACT During the interwar years, when Belgium struggled to overcome the destructions of the First World War and the economic slump of the Great Depression, the government launched one of the most ambitious construction projects in Belgian history. At the Parc du Cinquantenaire an impressive ensemble of buildings, halls and galleries was constructed during the 1920s and 1930s to house the collections of the Royal Museums of Art and History. Drawing new evidence from the archives of the museum, newspaper articles, and parliamentary proceedings, this article will examine how the curators in chief managed to secure enough funding for these ambitious projects in times of deep economic crisis. It will be argued that this tour de force was the result of a combination of factors, including intense lobbying, putting forward convincing arguments, and deploying a pragmatic realpolitik.

Gunpowder, Masculinity, and Warfare in German Texts, 1400–1700, by Patrick Brugh

In this book, Patrick Brugh traces the rise of gunpowder weapons as it was reflected in early modern German texts. The period 1400 to 1700 coincides with the ever-broader deployment of such weaponry on the battlefields of Europe, which was part of what has been called the Military Revolution. Brugh includes satirical epics, military treatises, books of war, broadsheets, war novels, plays and even poetry in his analysis, not shying away from discussing visual elements in these texts. On this broad source basis, resulting from his cultural-historical approach, Brugh thoroughly explores how gunpowder weapons were discussed in various social or political groups, that is, the different implied audiences of these sources. Brugh highlights the ambiguity of gunpowder weaponry in its impact on ideas of gender (mostly masculinity), morality of warfare and aesthetics within literary representation. In roughly chronological order, he discusses Heinrich Wittenwiler’s Der Ring (1409/10), a satirical Bauernschwank (‘peasant...

“Flemish Legends” by Charles de Coster. The Peculiarities of the Traslations into Dutch

Introduction. Charles de Coster's “Flemish Legends” were published in 1858 in French. With the growth of the national consciousness of the Flemings, this book, having particular artistic and cultural meaning, had to be translated, anyhow, into the Flemish variant of Dutch. There have been several translations, which differ significantly. To understand the specifics and success of a particular translation, it is necessary to analyze the cultural-linguistic and socio-political circumstances of its creation, to study the personalities of the translators, their artistic biographies, and also to assess the impact of the culture-forming factors.Methodology and sources. The research methodology is based on the descriptive method. At that we take into account a lot of linguistic, historical, social and cultural variables. As a study material two translations of “Flemish Legends” into Dutch (1917 and 1998) are chosen, as well as several sources describing the history of Belgium after 1830. For collating the translations the comparative method is used, taking into account the lexical, grammatical and stylistic features of the analyzed texts.Results and discussion. Charles De Coster, being a bilingual, preferred the French language. This can be explained by his desire to make folklore an asset of the upper social class, mainly bilinguals and francophones, upon these legends being already known among the Flemings. In addition, for the proper resonance, it was more profitable to publish the book in French. It can also be assumed that the legends were collected throughout Flanders; therefore, there were significant dialectal differences and problems for choosing a unified version of the Flemish language. To convey the medieval flavor, Charles de Coster used a deliberately archaized language. At the beginning of the 20th century S. Streuvels created a specific translation, more reminiscent of calque from French and preserving the features of the original text. At the end of the 20th century, W. Spillebeen translated the French text into a modern language, which was not the Belgian Dutch, but the standard Dutch.Conclusion. The translations discussed are quite different. S. Streuvels retained the style and structure of the original text, so his work was difficult for perception even by his contemporaries, and today the translation has become practically unreadable. W. Spillebeen tried to translate the legends into a modern language, bringing the structural components in line with the modern norm and preserving only the most necessary archaisms. Nevertheless, the text of the “Flemish legends” in the Belgian Dutch does not exist: they are written either in dialects, or in the “Frenchified” Dutch, or in the standard Dutch.

The French heritage put to the test of time: history of criminal procedure in Belgium (1814-2020)

The history of Belgium’s criminal procedure is deeply related to its French heritage through its Code d’instruction criminelle of 1808 still in force nowadays. In order to portray the modern history of Belgium’s criminal procedure, this paper aims at emphasizing the evolution of the reform initiatives regarding the most symbolic aspects inherited from the French procedure: the Code of 1808 itself, the pretrial investigation focused on the juge d’instruction’s person and the emblematic popular justice of the cour d’assises. Divided into six periods from 1814 to 2020, this historical research will address and contextualize issues such as the replacement or the maintaining of the French Code, the improvement of the instruction according to its Napoleonic main features or its transformation into another type of pretrial investigation as well as the limitation or even the abolition of popular justice.

Beyond the ‘Sham’ Critique and the Narrative of Humanitarianism: A Rejoinder to Jochen von Bernstorff

This is a Rejoinder to Jochen von Bernstorff’s Reply to our Article, ‘Monopolizing War: Codifying the Laws of War to Reassert Governmental Authority, 1856–1874’. We challenge von Bernstroff’s assertion that we argued that international humanitarian law is merely a sham and his description of our historical approach as focused on the domestic. Rather than conceiving this history as merely one of power relations between weaker and stronger states, our argument pierces the sovereign veil of states and considers how tensions between governments, elites, and the broader public influenced the history of the laws of war. Furthermore, the thrust of our argument is that democratization processes in this formative period (1856–1874) set in motion civil society initiatives that reverberated in the battlefields of Europe and shaped the content and form of the laws of war. Our project is meant to help us better understand the past and, in doing so, shed light on the meaningful efforts to insert humanitarian values into the interpretation of the laws of war.

Pas de deux, out of step

Abstract This article aims to complement two earlier ones by Theo van der Meer and Joke Swiebel in the previous issue of this journal (Swiebel, 2019; Van der Meer, 2019) on the history of homosexuality’s criminalisation in the Netherlands by exploring the same theme from a Belgian perspective. Whereas article 248bis of the Dutch penal code raised the age of consent for homosexual relations from 1911 to 1971, its highly similar Belgian counterpart, article 372bis, was only adopted in 1965 and repealed again in 1985. The analysis will not only devote attention to this striking chronological divergence, but also point to important parallels and cross-border connections. While, individually, this contribution is primarily an attempt to tentatively contextualise homosexuality’s legal history in Belgium, it may be hoped that, together with Van der Meer’s and Swiebel’s, it may serve as a call for more much-needed comparative research on the history of (homo)sexuality in the Low Countries.

NaturalHeritage: Bridging Belgian natural history collections

The Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (RBINS), the Royal Museum for Central Africa (RMCA) and Meise Botanic Garden house more than 50 million specimens covering all fields of natural history. While many different research topics have their own specificities, throughout the years it became apparent that with regards to collection data management, data publication and exchange via community standards, collection holding institutions face similar challenges (James et al. 2018, Rocha et al. 2014). In the past, these have been tackled in different ways by Belgian natural history institutions. In addition to local and national collaborations, there is a great need for a joint structure to share data between scientific institutions in Europe and beyond. It is the aim of large networks and infrastructures such as the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), the Biodiversity Information Standards (TDWG), the Distributed System of Scientific collections (DiSSCo) and the Consortium of European Taxonomic Facilities (CETAF) to further implement and improve these efforts, thereby gaining ever increasing efficiencies. In this context, the three institutions mentioned above, submitted the NaturalHeritage project (http://www.belspo.be/belspo/brain-be/themes_3_HebrHistoScien_en.stm) granted in 2017 by the Belgian Science Policy Service, which runs from 2017 to 2020. The project provides links among databases and services. The unique qualities of each database are maintained, while the information can be concentrated and exposed in a structured way via one access point. This approach aims also to link data that are unconnected at present (e.g. relationship between soil/substrate, vegetation and associated fauna) and to improve the cross-validation of data. (1) The NaturalHeritage prototype (http://www.naturalheritage.be) is a shared research portal with an open access infrastructure, which is still in the development phase. Its backbone is an ElasticSearch catalogue, with Kibana, and a Python aggregator gathering several types of (re)sources: relational databases, REpresentational State Transfer (REST) services of objects databases and bibliographical data, collections metadata and the GBIF Internet Publishing Toolkit (IPT) for observational and taxonomical data. Semi-structured data in English are semantically analysed and linked to a rich autocomplete mechanism. Keywords and identifiers are indexed and grouped in four categories (“what”, “who”, “where”, “when”). The portal can act also as an Open Archives Initiatives Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) service and ease indexing of the original webpage on the internet with microdata enrichment. (2) The collection data management system of DaRWIN (Data Research Warehouse Information Network) of RBINS and RMCA has been improved as well. External (meta)data requirements, i.e. foremost publication into or according to the practices and standards of GBIF and OBIS (Ocean Biogeographic Information System: https://obis.org) for biodiversity data, and INSPIRE (https://inspire.ec.europa.eu) for geological data, have been identified and evaluated. New and extended data structures have been created to be compliant with these standards, as well as the necessary procedures developed to expose the data. Quality control tools for taxonomic and geographic names have been developed. Geographic names can be hard to confirm as their lack of context often requires human validation. To address this a similarity measure is used to help map the result. Species, locations, sampling devices and other properties have been mapped to the World Register of Marine Species and DarwinCore (http://www.marinespecies.org), Marine Regions and GeoNames, the AGRO Agronomy and Vertebrate trait ontologies and the British Oceanographic Data Centre (BODC) vocabularies (http://www.obofoundry.org/ontology/agro.html). Extensive mapping is necessary to make use of the ExtendedMeasurementOrFact Extension of DarwinCore (https://tools.gbif.org/dwca-validator/extensions.do). External (meta)data requirements, i.e. foremost publication into or according to the practices and standards of GBIF and OBIS (Ocean Biogeographic Information System: https://obis.org) for biodiversity data, and INSPIRE (https://inspire.ec.europa.eu) for geological data, have been identified and evaluated. New and extended data structures have been created to be compliant with these standards, as well as the necessary procedures developed to expose the data. Quality control tools for taxonomic and geographic names have been developed. Geographic names can be hard to confirm as their lack of context often requires human validation. To address this a similarity measure is used to help map the result. Species, locations, sampling devices and other properties have been mapped to the World Register of Marine Species and DarwinCore (http://www.marinespecies.org), Marine Regions and GeoNames, the AGRO Agronomy and Vertebrate trait ontologies and the British Oceanographic Data Centre (BODC) vocabularies (http://www.obofoundry.org/ontology/agro.html). Extensive mapping is necessary to make use of the ExtendedMeasurementOrFact Extension of DarwinCore (https://tools.gbif.org/dwca-validator/extensions.do).

The Priest Who Put Europe Back Together: The Life of Father Fabian Flynn, CP by Sean Brennan

Reviewed by: The Priest Who Put Europe Back Together: The Life of Father Fabian Flynn, CP by Sean Brennan Todd Scribner The Priest Who Put Europe Back Together: The Life of Father Fabian Flynn, CP. By Sean Brennan. Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2018. 312 pp. $34.95. The title of Sean Brennan's recently published book on Father Fabian Flynn, CP is a bold one and, as such, overpromises. The numerous individuals, organizations, and government programs that helped piece Europe back together in the two decades following World War II were all in their own way indispensable efforts at putting Europe back together again. Nevertheless, some were more important than others and Flynn certainly fell on the more important side of the ledger. It is the story of a life worth telling and is done in a way that effectively allows the reader to understand this important and generally overlooked personality. A Passionist priest ordained in 1931, Father Fabian Flynn had promised himself to a monastic life, although he spent most of his prime years in the battlefields of Europe or in humanitarian work following the war, most notably in response to crises that emerged in countries including Austria, Hungary, and Yugoslavia. His success outside of the monastery—primarily in his employment at Catholic Relief Services (CRS)—and his happiness in this work might make a reader wonder whether or not his commitment to a monastic vocation was ever a wise decision. Regardless, his time away from the monastery proved to be a source of continual tension between himself and his religious superiors; his work in the field a source of great contentment. Some of the professional opportunities that Flynn held in Europe were a consequence of sheer persistence on this part. He repeatedly fell ill as a young man and probably had no business being sent to the battlefield. Nonetheless, his continual pestering of military leadership to deploy him into the field eventually bore fruit and he spent several years ministering to soldiers on the battlefield, all the while experiencing the dangers of combat firsthand. His bravery on the field brought with it recognition, including at one point a purple heart. [End Page 96] Other opportunities emerged due more to chance than through an act of will. As the longtime Catholic chaplain to the Blue Spaders, which happened to be deployed near Nuremberg at the end of the war, Flynn was named as a military chaplain at the International Military Tribunal. There he encountered a range of German military personnel who were put to trial for their war crimes and had the opportunity to befriend their friends and family. All these efforts were important, but it was his demonstrated success and commitment to the relief work of CRS, which played a significant role in providing relief to displaced populations and the broader populations of Europe. Brennan's account of this period of Fr. Flynn's life is particularly captivating, as it effectively draws together the actions of one individual in the context of a much larger organizational, political, and social context. One of the most rewarding aspects of the book is the way in which Brennan effectively interweaves the personal narrative of Flynn with the broader historical context that informed his work in Europe. Anyone interested in World War II, in post-war Europe, or in more recent Catholic history would benefit by making a point to read it. At the very least, every Catholic university library should have a copy of this book on their shelves. As elucidating a book as it is, there are some factual flaws that should have been caught at some point in the publication process. In a section detailing the founding of Catholic Relief Services, for example, Brennan correctly notes that it was established in 1943 under the authority of its parent organization, the National Catholic Welfare Conference (NCWC). This institution, founded in 1917 as the National Catholic War Council, functioned as the national "headquarters" for the U.S. Catholic bishops. He proceeds to note that "in 1922, the organization was renamed the National Catholic Welfare Conference, keeping the same initials, and it maintains the name to the present...

The “Belgian” Jewish Experience of World War One

The history of Belgium’s Jewish community and its experience of the First World War has yet to be written. While during the last few years some articles have been published on Jews and the First World War in Belgium, a few notable ones in this journal, a detailed and exhaustive study of how the Jewish communities in Belgium fared during the war is still inexistent. In this introductory article I do not intend to offer such an exhaustive overview, nor present radically new information regardin...

Canada at Peace and Soldiers at War: Canadian U.N. Soldiers in Korea, Egypt, and Vietnam

In recent years, Canadian peacekeeping and UN involvement has assumed a place of high regard, reverence, and veneration, often at the expense of Canada’s military past. While its glorification is in many ways justified, the mythology surrounding Canada’s peacekeeping role has compelled many Canadians to view Canada solely as a peacekeeping nation. As a result, peacekeeping has become the “touchstone of our identity.” This mythology distorts the reality of Canadian military action to the point where Canadian veterans of NATO conflicts are often forgotten and it ignores the fact that many of the first peacekeepers left Canada “virtually unnoticed,” without the recognition and support of their nation. The mythology of peacekeeping misrepresents Canadian military conflicts and ignores that, in spite of the characterization of peacekeepers as nonviolent and unbiased actors, the majority of them were first and foremost Canadian soldiers, many of whom veterans of World War II. For the soldiers who came of age on the battlefields of Europe, the role of peacekeeping was a frustrating and politically charged experience, whereby they held no power and they felt they made very little positive impact. Despite the virtually universal glorification and celebration of peacekeepers in recent years, investigation of the “Cold War Home Front” demonstrates the difficulties faced by Canadian NATO soldiers, U.N. peacekeepers and their families in a society that wanted to move beyond the years of struggle, pain and sacrifice in war time and had little sympathy for the men and women who ‘chose’ to leave their families to serve in wars their nation was not fighting.

Through Belgian Eyes: Charlotte Brontë's Troubled Brussels Legacy by Helen MacEwan

Reviewed by: Through Belgian Eyes: Charlotte Brontë's Troubled Brussels Legacy by Helen MacEwan Amber Pouliot (bio) Review of Helen MacEwan, Through Belgian Eyes: Charlotte Brontë's Troubled Brussels Legacy (Eastbourne: Sussex University Press, 2018) 258 pages, ISBN 978-1-84519-910-4 Between February 1842 and January 1844, Charlotte Brontë lived, studied, and worked at the Pensionnat de Demoiselles Heger-Parent, in Brussels. Much has been written about the impact of this continental sojourn on Brontë's literary development, which is especially evident in her two Belgian novels, The Professor (her first-written novel, completed in 1846 but published posthumously in 1857) and Villette (1853). There has also been a great deal of (often salacious) speculation regarding the nature of Brontë's relationship with Constantin Heger, her literary professor and the husband of her employer, Zoë Heger. Helen MacEwan's engaging and informative new book, Through Belgian Eyes: Charlotte Brontë's Troubled Brussels Legacy, offers readers something entirely original, redirecting our focus to consider Charlotte's impact on Brussels and the Belgians, tracing her reception from the first French translations of her novels, in the mid-nineteenth century, to the present day. MacEwan's book will, of course, be of interest to Brontë fans and scholars, as well as those with a more general interest in the family, especially now during their bicentenaries from 2016–2020. Written in an accessible style and featuring a timeline of Brontë's reception in Belgium (including translations of her novels, the publication dates of influential biographies, and the release dates of film adaptations), it will be useful to undergraduates and postgraduates studying Brontë and her literary legacy. But it includes so much fresh material that it will also be immensely useful to scholars researching and teaching the Brontës. Through Belgian Eyes also offers a fascinating history of Brussels in its own right, focusing on the period of Brontë's residence but extending from 1830, when Belgium gained its independence from the Netherlands, to the present. For this reason, the book will appeal to readers with even a general interest in the long nineteenth century or in Belgian history [End Page 320] and culture. Over fourteen chapters, an introduction, and conclusion, MacEwan paints a remarkably vivid picture of Brussels society, covering such varied topics as its religious expression and fondness for pageantry, its rigidly stratified class system and extremes of wealth and poverty, its political climate and expressions of patriotism, and its national character and cultural productions. Among its many virtues, MacEwan's book is richly illustrated. It features more than seventy images, ranging from landscapes and cityscapes to pictures of citizens in Belgian national dress, portraits and photographs of prominent people, maps, reproductions of paintings, and illustrations of many streets and buildings that are no longer in existence due to a relentless process of urban development and renewal. As MacEwan demonstrates, the Brussels of today would be nearly unrecognizable to the Brontës; the Pensionnat Heger-Parent, the Rue Isabelle, the Protestant Cemetery, and many of the streets that Charlotte and Emily traversed have all been razed in order to make way for new building projects, a process that has become known as "Bruxellisation." In addition to making it possible for readers to visualize the Brontës' Brussels, MacEwan puts Brontë's descriptions of Belgian life into context, and in this way, disrupts entrenched understandings of her relationship with Brussels and portrayal of its customs and people. Brontë's acerbic descriptions of Belgium in her novels and letters home, her insistence that the national character was cold, selfish, slow-witted, and prone to deceit, have often been dismissed as narrow-minded prejudice. More charitably, they have been read in terms of her personal unhappiness and homesickness while in Brussels and her depression on returning home to find Heger cold and uncommunicative. MacEwan enriches our understanding by placing Brontë's observations in the context of other writers, including William Makepeace Thackeray, Lord Byron, and Charles Baudelaire, who mocked the little capital in similar terms. Brontë's insistence that Villette is a city of spies—a claim that might strike modern readers as farfetched and bigoted—finds some justification in MacEwan's discussion of...

The multiple roles of battlefield war museums: a study at Fromelles and Passchendaele

ABSTRACTToday’s war museums are large institutions that cater to a broad range of people and provide a number of functions. In recent years, activities and displays relating to the notion of ‘edutainment’ have been incorporated into their offerings. On the Great War battlefields of Europe, the war museums tend to address specific battles that were fought in the immediate area, and traditionally they attracted visitors with a familial or national connection to the site. An on-site survey at two battlefield war museums found that remembrance remains a primary function, but overall, visitors did not support the museums as places for leisure experiences. Personal connections, both familial and national, were important, and while a broader European connection was strongly supported, it was not unique to any particular group. Peace and anti-war appeared to be seen as distinct elements. The study reinforces previous work in the field that argues personal connection provides the initial motivation for visitation.

Specters of Colonialism - Sven Augustijnen's Haunted Cinema

The author analyzes Sven Agustijnen's Specters from the philosophical perspective. He tries to prove that the cinema of the Belgian director is haunted because it presents the reality as made out of traces, which disturb the traditional division into presence and absence. The author analyzes Augustijnen's film techniques and uses Jacques Derrida hauntology to show, how contemporary cinema tries to face the difficult and unfinished colonial history of Belgium (the genocide in Congo during the reign of the Belgian king Leopold II and the murder of the first prime minister of the independent Congo, Patrice Lumumba).

Maud Frère, interprète de l’Histoire : Les jumeaux millénaires et le conflit de 1940-1945

This article concerns the portrayal of the World War II in the Belgian literature on the basis of Les Jumeaux millenaires Maud Frere (1923-1979). Published in 1962, the novel is considered as one of few testimonies of German Occupation in Belgium, its influence on the post-war Belgian-Belgian conflicts (Quastion royale, 1940-1945) and the literary output (deshistoire). This autobiographic narration, full of bitterness and disappointment, portrays a literary and very subjective interpretation of this shameful, unsaid and often neglected period in the Belgian history.