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Interpretation of American History in the Context of Contemporary U.S. Society: From Bradley Commission to 21st Century History Curriculum
Vondrová, Petra ; Kozák, Kryštof (advisor) ; Kýrová, Lucie (referee)
The thesis aims to analyze the relationship of the collective memory of an individual and his/her inclusion with the society and eventual ability to generate social capital. This paper evaluates the American federal education system and its interpretation of the historical narrative to the students. The focus of this thesis is the interpretation of historical events in the context of American society, whose structure has changed fundamentally over the past 30 years. Not only society has suffered a significant change, the federal system of student testing and the federal education institutions' funding have been revised too. American society can benefit from it through internal intercourse or, on the contrary, it can become more fragmented if it fails to bring the individual into a contemporary social setting. The work has been defined in time since the Bradley Commission has issued general recommendations to change approach to historical curricula, and then continues to explore the development until 2014. The political changes with the end of the Cold War led to a constant reinterpretation of American history and the secondary the collective identity. In the new millennium and after the year 2014 it has concluded in a discussion about historical education on academic, social and political fields....
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Seal Hunting in the Canadian Arctic:Conflicting Perspectives on EU Regulation 1007/2009
Jírová, Anna ; Fiřtová, Magdalena (advisor) ; Kýrová, Lucie (referee)
On September 16, 2009 the European parliament adopted a Regulation (EC) 1007/2009 prohibiting the seal products from being imported and placed on the European Union market. Adoption of a Seal trade ban was a result of an effective anti-sealing lobby and increasing public concern over the perceivably cruel seal hunting methods that emerged in reaction to growing popularity of seal fur in early 2000s. Even though the Seal ban includes an exception for Inuit who hunt seals traditionally for subsistence and depend on monetary income to maintain their traditions, it proved to be highly ineffective as the demand for all seal products declined dramatically, threatening Inuit way of life in the process. The purpose of this thesis is to examine the key actors involved in the conflict, specifically the Inuit, the European Union, animal welfare NGOs and the Canadian government and to contextualize and analyze the specific narratives of the seal hunting discourse and their implications. By looking at the motivation and justification of the EU Seal ban as well as the implications of the different perspectives on the issue, this research will try to test the hypothesis that the seal hunting discourse is based on a colonial mindset and that decolonization of the mind is yet to be achieved by Western society.
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The Concept of Duality in Culture and Myths of Lakota Indians
Perlíková, Klára ; Šavelková, Lívia (advisor) ; Heřmanský, Martin (referee) ; Kýrová, Lucie (referee)
The Concept of Duality in Culture and Myths of Lakota Indians The purpose of the dissertation is to explore and research the broad topic of culture of Lakota Indians from the perspective of secondary abstraction inspired by the structuralist approach to anthropology. The concept of duality is perceived here as a general concept which is - as it is our belief - present across various categories and areas of Lakota culture, both in the past and in the present. The dissertation is conceived as a set of chapters each of which deals with a different area of Lakota culture from the perspective of this secondary abstraction. First, we specify and define our understanding of duality and show how the original approach of structural anthropology has been modified in the course of time by postmodernists' critique. The theoretical introduction is followed by studies of four areas of Lakota culture in which the concept of duality is shown. The first two topics - Lakota myths and traditional visual art of the Lakota - are based primarily on ethnographical data collected by other researchers of the area. On the other hand, the other two areas - Lakota identity and the phenomenon of contemporary summer powwows in Lakota reservations - are based largely on the author's research in this area in summer 2014 and 2015....
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The analysis of the influence bourgeois bohemians on american society
Čech, Dominik ; Kýrová, Lucie (advisor) ; Pondělíček, Jiří (referee)
This bachelor thesis deals with the influence of social class, the so-called bourgeois bohemians on American society. The time scope of this work is mainly the turn of the twenty-first century and ends with the economic crisis of 2007. On the background of the transforamtion of modern societies into postmodern, which are characterized by heterogeneity and variability of life attitudes and in which individuality, its behaviour, a values are constantly less determined by class, American author indetified new "upper", class, which represents a new establishment. This thesis presents an introduction and definition of the so-called Bobos class and its categorisation within the context of American society, based mainly on socio-economic factors. This thesis also presents an analysis of the influence of this class on American society. I seek to answer three main question: In what way did can bobos formulated the form of American society? How much they are responsible for the yet more increasing inequality in American society? Are bobos truly "alternative capitalists"?
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Women on the Periphery: The Invisible Empire Reborn
Novota, Pavel ; Calda, Miloš (advisor) ; Sehnálková, Jana (referee) ; Kýrová, Lucie (referee)
The thesis examines the role of women in the Ku Klux Klan in the early 1920s. The author seeks to analyze the following aspects: the main goal is to prove that the foundation and the very existence of the women's auxiliary (WKKK) points to inner tensions within the movement. The WKKK, therefore, can be used as a model or a case study in order to highlight all the issues the Klan had to face, from financial struggles and various allegations to transient and unstable membership. Secondly, the author sets out to verify whether and to what degree WKKK members legitimized the Klan, be it from the outside (public opinion) or from the inside. The author also places emphasis on the fact that the Klan should not be primarily viewed as a violent racist organization, but as a group of members who felt threatened by the outside world from which they needed to shelter themselves. Social life of the Klan and what role Klanswomen had, charity work, or interventions in local affairs play a vital role in this thesis as a result. Last but not least, proper understanding of primary sources is essential. They are obviously highly subjective and serve as a prime example of how reality differed from what was stated. (W)KKK pamphlets and writings were colored by fear of the so-called "other". Most texts written by...
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The 2016 Democratic Party presidential primary elections
Laksarová, Veronika ; Kýrová, Lucie (advisor) ; Sehnálková, Jana (referee)
The US presidential election in 2016 is a very important event not only for America itself, but for the whole world as well due to the American influence. This thesis focuses on the process of candidate's nomination for the general election, thus on the primary election of the Democratic Party. The topic of the primary elections is limitedly reflected in the Czech environment not only by specialized literature, but also by the media, mainly due to their time-consumption, complexity and lack of similarity to the Czech system. For these reasons, the whole system of primary elections represents the first part of the thesis. The practical part of the thesis is aiming to analyse political attitudes and programs of selected democratic candidates in 2016 - Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. Selected candidates are compared in the three thematic areas that voters considered as the most important according to pre-election surveys in 2016. The areas include the economy and employment, national security and healthcare. The aim of the thesis, besides of the enlightening of the primary election system and the comparison of candidates, is to answer the hypothetical question whether or not Bernie Sanders could have influenced the result of the general election in the case he would have won the primary elections....
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The Memory of the Lost Cause and White Southern Nationalism: Case Study of the League of the South
Radová, Hana ; Pondělíček, Jiří (advisor) ; Kýrová, Lucie (referee)
Following the end of the Civil War, the revisionist myth of the Lost Cause spread over the South as an apologist narrative for white hegemony and slavery, which protected the former Confederate states from the devastating effects of their loss. Pro-Confederate organizations lobbied to replace real history with this collective memory of the South through education and memorialization. This national myth then served as a legitimization of white Southern nationalism that sought to restore white hegemony of the antebellum racial order. The white nationalist organization League of the South, whose goal is the second secession of the Southern states, embraces and manifests the ideology of the Lost Cause in its textual and audiovisual discourse and use of iconography. This discourse anchors their separatist intentions in the context of postwar collective memory, and aids the organization in the legitimization of their actions on the basis of revisionist history. The League derives its identity from this collective memory as the self-established white Southern ethnicity of Anglo-Celtic origin and the descendants of Founding Fathers as well as Confederate leaders. In doing so, the League identifies itself as the organization of true heirs of America stigmatized by the external aggression of the federal...
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Sexual assaults on College Campuses: A Case Study of the University of Richmond
Steňková, Gabriela ; Kýrová, Lucie (advisor) ; Sehnálková, Jana (referee)
This work is a case study of sexual violence at the University of Richmond, which examines the major cases and changes that took place at the university in the period from 2011 to 2021. The topic of sexual violence on American campuses has received much attention prevention in 2011 and the increase in protests against sexual violence in 2017 led to greater public attention, during which students criticized universities for their inaction against perpetrators of sexual assault. In selected cases, this work points to the fact that the University of Richmond has faced several media-known cases of sexual harassment, which has forced it to take steps to increase the prevention of sexual violence on its campus. Furthermore, this study points to the limits of ethical research and restrictions that are associated with research on sexual harassment on American campuses. This made the possibility of agreeing research on campus more difficult and also pointed out that although university academics are aware that the data obtained by the questionnaire would be beneficial to the university, it is not possible for such research to be in charge as a primary research student.
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The Power of the Native Vote: Evaluation of the Influence of Native Americans on the Outcome of the 2020 Presidential Elections in the United States - A Case Study of Arizona.
Štroblová, Radka ; Kýrová, Lucie (advisor) ; Pondělíček, Jiří (referee)
More Americans voted in the 2020 elections than in any other in 120 years, and the majority supported the Democratic candidate - Joseph R. Biden, Jr. In 2020, Biden won 26 states, including Arizona, where he won as the first Democrat in the presidential elections since 1996. With a small margin of only 10,457 votes, every vote was essential. In Arizona, 412,256 people identify as American Indian and Alaska Native and their support for the Democratic candidate proved to be decisive in the 2020 elections. However, only little has been written about American Indians and Alaska Natives and their voting habits. Existing studies suffer from examining only one tribe or state, are old or ambiguous. American Indians and Alaska Natives are also often excluded from collecting and reporting data, and when included, the data is either inaccurate or put them in "the other" category. This work is the first to examine Native American voting in the 2020 presidential election. It aims to prove that the Native vote was one of the aspects that helped Biden win the elections since Native Americans traditionally support the Democratic candidates. To prove my thesis, I compared the results of the 2016 and 2020 elections from the precincts overlapping with tribal lands in Arizona and conducted a quantitative analysis of...
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