Izlaganja na konferenciji “Being a Student in the Habsburg Monarchy”
U radu međunarodne znanstvene konferencije, koja se 18. i 19. svibnja 2017. održavala na Hrvatskom institutu za povijest u Zagrebu, sudjelovali su i suradnici na projektu “Od protomodernizacije do modernizacije školstva u Hrvatskoj” dr. sc. Vlasta Švoger, dr. sc. Dinko Župan i dr. sc. Branko Ostajmer te tako svoja istraživanja u okviru projekta predstavili pred međunarodnom publikom. Izlagali su o sljedećim temama: 4
Dr. sc. Vlasta Švoger, Students from a Small Country in the Big City – Croatians Studying in Vienna in the 19th Century
Vienna as the capital of the Habsburg Monarchy with its rich cultural life and a prominent university attracted many students from Croatia in the 19th century. Graduation at the Vienna University opened the door to a good start in the State administration or to some other public duty or politics. For these reasons many well-off Croatian upper (aristocratic or noble) or middle class families sent their sons to study in Vienna. This paper reconstructs the life of Croatians students in the big city, on the basis of the autobiographies and the correspondence of four distinguished members of Croatian intellectual elite – the writer and physician Juraj Matija Šporer (1795-1884), the publicist and politician Andrija Torkvat Brlić (1826-1868) and his brother the politician Ignjat Brlić (1834-1892), and the writer and politician Ksaver Šandor Gjalski (1854-1935). The autobiographies of Šporer and Gjalski, and the family correspondence of the Brlić brothers, as well as the diary of A. T. Brlić provide a private insight in their student life in Vienna in the 19th century. The sources mentioned enable us to reconstruct their attitude to their studies and their student obligations, but also their opinion about some of their professors and their teaching methods. The above mentioned Croatian students also wrote about their everyday life: attending the classes, learning, socializing with their fellow-students and some prominent intellectuals who lived in Vienna, but they also provide information about the formation of their cultural experiences. Depending on their financial resources, all of them more or less enjoyed the rich cultural offer of the Habsburg capital: they visited museums, galleries, theatres and concerts. Different experiences from the period of their schooling at the Vienna University helped them to become more self-confident and they also exerted a very positive influence on their future professional life. Although the material of autobiographical discourse and correspondence are private and personal sources, the information gathered from that kind of sources could be used as a material for analysing the high school system from the bottom up perspective, as well as for a cultural transfer from the centre to the periphery.
Dr. sc. Vlasta Švoger
Dr. sc. Dinko Župan, Being a Female Pupil – Education of Middle Class Girls in Croatia in the Second Half of the 19thCentury
The author presents the problem of women’s education in Croatia during the second half of the 19th century and shows how the middle and upper-middle class girls were educated in Croatia on the example of the writer VilmaVukelic’s schooling. In the first part of presentation Župan is dealing with the secondary school in Osijek where VilmaVukelic was educated for three years (1890-1893). From 1882, when it was founded, till the end of the 19th century, girls’ secondary school in Osijek was multinational and multidenominational educational institution. Catholic, Jewish, Orthodox and Protestant students were equally treated in religious education. Students’ mother tongues were German, Croatian, Serbian, Hungarian and Czech, which created the multicultural atmosphere in the school. Most of the students came from the middle class and the curriculum was adapted to them. The secondary schools were supposed to be the principal centres for moulding the behaviour of middle class girls. Constructing the female identity as a wife, mother and housewife was one of the main goals in education of the secondary school students. The school system of the 19th century made the so called “natural” categories of femininity and masculinity, which was visible in teaching programmes, school regulations, and school manuals, as well as in the organisation of the school itself, especially when it comes to the girls’ secondary schools. According to the opinions of the then educational authorities, doctors and psychologists, “the real woman” was only the one who completely fulfilled her duties as a housewife, wife and mother. In the second part of the presentation, the author is dealing with the private boarding schools in the 19th century Vienna because VilmaVukelic was educated in one of them for two years (1893-1895).
Dr. sc. Dinko Župan
Dr. sc. Branko Ostajmer, Croatian Academic Societies in Graz in the Late 19th and the Early 20th Centuries
Croatian writer Miroslav Krleža once said that he loved Graz, explaining: “that city was in its own way our city too: for decades we went there without a travel document. The generations and generations of our doctors, painters, musicians and poets were educated in Graz.” Krleža himself attended military schools in Hungary; however, the capital of Styria was indeed an important educational centre for Croatia, where hundreds of Croatian students gained education.
From Croatian perspective, the significance of Graz as a university centre had increased after Austria lost the city of Padua in war against Prussia (1866). After that, Croatian youth from Dalmatia turned to the Austrian universities, especially to Vienna and Graz. Furthermore, the Medical School in Graz was of special importance, as until 1917 the medicine could not be studied at the University of Zagreb (Royal University of Francis Joseph I).
Much of the social life of Croatian students in Graz took place in student societies. In the period 1868-1918 there were several such societies. Special attention is given to the student society “Hrvatska” (“Croatia”) as the most prominent and most significant Croatian academic society in Graz. This society was founded in 1875, continuing the tradition of earlier similar societies (“Hrvatska Danica”, founded in 1868, and “Adrijatik”).
The aim of the paper is to analyse the presence of Croatian students at the University of Graz in the period 1868-1918, to analyse their national, local and social structure, and, finally, to determine the number, activity and structure of Croatian academic societies in Graz.
Dr. sc. Branko Ostajmer
