Looking back at 2020

Since 2020 we have been involved in the Borders & Dialogue Project focused on the Czech-Polish relations existing especially in the Broumov region and southern Silesia. The project is supported by the International Visegrad Fund. Our Polish partner within the framework of the Project is the Department of Sociology at the University of Opole. Currently, we are more or less only in on-line contacts, but we are not giving in and we are improvising!

In January 2021, Van Anh Nguyen finished her bachelor’s degree studies and became the first graduate in the Transcultural Communication field of studies which is presented in English to international students. Being the members of the final state examination boards, we are equipped with battle shields and masks. Big thanks and congratulations to all our graduates on their courage!

In February we still managed to be presented “real” lectures by Associate Professor Marek Jakoubek, Director of the Institute of Ethnology of Faculty of Arts of Charles University, and at the beginning of March we were presented lectures by Associate Professor Vít Hušek from Sts Cyril and Methodius Faculty of Theology of Palacký University in Olomouc. The course “Importance of values in the changing world” was provided on-line by Professor Josef Freise from Katholische Hochschule Nordrhein-Westfalen in Köln. The existence of the possibility of virtual teaching was really advantageous – Doctor Zdenka Sokolíčková was able to provide her courses to Master students in spite of her being beyond the Arctic Circle.

The book “Kyber a eko: Digitální technologie v enviromentálních souvislostech” (Zdenka Sokolíčková (ed.), Manfred Spitzer, Václav Bělohradský, Martin Leskovjan, Jeremiáš Havranu, Jana Karlová, Martin Soukup, Jan D. Bláha, with the epilogue by Marek O. Vácha) was published with a slight delay in January.
Doctor David Bouma, who is involved in the international project “Social cohesion in the context of migration”, initiated his habilitation procedure.
Zdenka Sokolíčková, who received an award for science at the UHK, is finishing her two-year field research in the town of Longyearbyen in Svalbard. The documentary „Visitors“, which presents the boREALIFE project and her family´s life, is being currently shot (directed by Veronika Lišková). The Svalbard Science Forum awarded Zdenka Sokolíčková with a grant supporting her project “Teenagers without land: Offspring of economic migrants to Svalbard in an overheated world.”
Professor Tomáš Petráček was invited to a prestigious workshop held within the framework of the project “Roman Curia and the German Dispute over Integrism in the Early 20th Century” in Venice. The Vyšehrad publishing house published interviews with him under the title “Naděje v dějinách” (“Hopes in History”). The book was nearly immediately sold out and appeared, for example, on the list of the most prominent titles of 2020, which was made by editors of Respekt magazine.

Students are reacting to the current situation with a new format of group projects and they are making podcasts (The Impact of Social Networks on Adolescents, Fast Fashion and Sustainable Fashion, Minimalism, The Clash of Two Monotheistic Religions, How the Media Influence Us). In particular, we appreciate the fact that our students do not give in and face inconveniences of virtual learning. Despite the current situation, some of our students accomplished their student mobilities.
The “Jihlava” International Festival of Documentary Films presented the documentary made by our graduate Markéta Janků and entitled “Ve jménu bezpečnosti” (“In the Name of Safety”).
Big thanks to our student Lucie Rejlová for her pop art portraits of the transcultural teaching team!