Stýkání a proplétání středoevropské vědy
The encounter and entanglement of East-Central European science

Summary/Abstract: After many years of dominance of national history, new perspectives and concepts are rapidly gaining ground in historiography. In the history of science, this applies in particular to the concept of the history of entanglements of knowledge, which focuses on science in intercultural movement. The article describes the historical development of the concept of entanglements since the 1980s and highlights its potential use for studying the highly heterogeneous and multilingual knowledge of Central and Eastern Europe. It focuses on the most important historiographical conceptual changes of the last three decades that have affected the concept of entanglements. It highlights its use in the history of science in Central and Eastern Europe as well as different conceptualisations of entanglements ranging from cultural transfer to global history. It also introduces historiographical debates about Central Europe as well as the local sites of knowledge, and attempts to conceptualise the problem of asymmetries. The article shows that the use of the concept of entanglements helps to reconstruct a very dynamic picture of knowledge exchange that has so far been obscured by the optics of the “dependency” thesis and the previously dominant centre–periphery approaches. Finally, use of the concept of entanglement also has the considerable advantage of bringing to light hitherto marginalised actors who have nevertheless played a crucial role in shaping knowledge in the Central European region.

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