Jazyk v historickom výskume:
Language in historical research:

Political implications of language practice in Hungary in the 16th and 17th centuries

Summary/Abstract: BENKA, Peter. Language in historical research: Political implications of language practice in Hungary in the 16th and 17th centuries. Historický časopis, 2022, 70, 4, pp. 639–663, Bratislava.The paper shows socio-cultural historical research into multilingualism as one of the possible approaches to the analysis of early modern Hungarian society. The emphasis is put on the broadly defined political sphere, respecting its early modern meanings and contexts. The analysis of multilingualism rests on examples both from social practice and the intellectual discourse that dealt with the roles that were ascribed to various languages within the hierarchically ordered early modern society. Two perspectives were used as groundwork when ordering the source material and its subsequent analysis. Firstly, attention is devoted to pragmatic attitudes towards multilingualism present in Hungary. They were represented by acknowledgment of the existing situation, and then search for effective ways to work with it in order to achieve particular (political) aims. Secondly, the analysis focuses on situations when language was instrumentalized – both practically and symbolically – in the political activities within the distinction of “own/native/local” against “foreign/alien”, as a means of inclusion or exclusion. Eventually, it is proposed that the phenomenon of language played specific roles in the political sphere also in the early modern period in spite of a lack of institutional and intellectual background comparable to those of modern times.

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