Bluegrass is a music form often considered to be necessarily or uniquely connected to Appalachia. Significant popular and scholarly discourses (Malone, Negus, etc.) support the sense of a homological relationship (Middleton, Born, Murphy) linking certain rural spaces with country musics. At the same time, bluegrass has a broad and varied global appeal. Abroad, bluegrass is often a part of "Americanism," the negotiation of cultural elements from the United States--and is subject to an array of different cultural politics. This presentation presents an analysis and contextualization of three Czech bluegrass-related songs to indicate some ways in which bluegrass music makers can create a sense of place far afield from the music's putative geographic roots. During their long history of Americanism Czechs have inscribed "real imaginary" elements of Americana on their environment, laying a foundation for the current interest in bluegrass music. Czech articulations of this imagined "Amerika" in translated, newly-created, and recontextualized bluegrass songs reveals a playful ambiguity. Czechs have cultivated this music and sense of place through Americanisms that blur boundaries between what is American and what is Czech. These cases challenge homologies of sound and geography, and provide new ways to consider music and place in Appalachia.

Excerpt: Proc ty housle? ("Why the fiddle?") - "Fiddlers are all bad here - Why not write about the banjo or something else that Czechs are good at?"These questions about my ethnographic fieldwork came from musician colleagues with whom I working in researching bluegrass music in the Czech Republic, during a jam circle around a table. While these colleagues were mainly banjo and guitar players, these critiques of Czech fiddling are common even among Czech fiddlers, who are in many cases not as accomplished (in technical skill or musicality) as are their banjo-playing and mandolin-picking compatriots.

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This final thesis works with the topic of standard Czech language at the 1st level of primary schools. The theoretical part deals with the units of the Czech national language, standard Czech language and its development, current phenomenons in contemporary Czech, common Czech language, Czech dialects and sociolects. Furthermore, it briefly describes the development of teaching of standard Czech language at schools and other possibilities of teachers. It also analyzes particular morphological aspects of individual morphological changes subsequently examined in the practical part. The empirical part is a quantitative analysis and comparison of the ability of pupils of the first grade of selected schools in the Central Bohemian Region to identify the non-standard expressions and replace them with the correct standard forms. The work partly verifies the selected hypotheses and compares the results primarily with the results of similar research carried out at the 2nd level of primary schools.

This thesis examines Canada’s imposition of a visa requirement on visitors from the Czech Republic. By analyzing articles in three major Canadian newspapers, I conduct an Althusserian (theory that “culture ventures” are part of the Ideological State Apparatus), analysis. The thesis demonstrates that a dominant ideological viewpoint – a pro-capitalist ideology supported by a racist ideology – was evident in the coverage in all three newspapers. Additionally, this thesis addresses the presence of more ‘even-handed’ discussions of the conditions of the Roma, including experiences of racism and discrimination in the Czech Republic. I conclude that the newspapers present ideological views, with occasional exceptions.

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捷克共和國(以下簡稱捷克)與中華人民共和國(以下簡稱中國)之間的外交與經濟關係有著悠久的傳統和深層的複雜性。1989年捷克與中國首次有獨立政策。到目前為止，Václav Havel與Václav Klaus 兩個總統都有機會影響中捷的關係。如何獲取中國的青睞並在神話般的中國市場佔有一席之地, 他們所用的方法基本上是不同的。 Havel總統在行使他的外交政策時,從來沒有停止強調人權與其他敏感的話題。相反地,他繼任者Klaus總統採取更務實的方法去安撫中以減少貿易迷差以及幫助捷克出國到中國。 此論文的主要重點是在探討兩種不同的方法如何影響捷克在中國企業的經濟成功以及中捷之間的綜合關係。此論文也會觸及中捷之間外交與經濟兩方面的交互影響，期望舆誤解。 / The diplomatic and economic relations between the Czech Republic (CZ) and the People's Republic of China (PRC) have a long tradition and a deep level of complexity. In 1989, the CZ had the first chance to conduct its independent foreign policy towards the PRC. So far, two presidents, Václav Havel and Václav Klaus, had the opportunity to influence the relations between the CZ and the PRC. Their approaches of how to gain the PRC's favor and cut off its share of the mythical Chinese market were fundamentally different. The first president Havel in his conduct of foreign policy never ceased to stress human rights and other sensitive topics. In contrast, his successor Vávlav Klaus chose a more pragmatic approach of appeasing the PRC in order to decrease the trade deficit and help Czech export in the PRC. How these two different approaches influenced the economic success of Czech firms in the PRC and the relations generally, will be the main focus of my thesis. Questions of the relations between the economic and diplomatic sphere as well as features and misconceptions regarding the relations will be addressed as well.

Inaug.-diss.--Berlin, 1912. / Cover title. Lebenslauf. "Text und kuzer Auszug aus den Tafeln des Anhanges." Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2003. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 337-353).

The aim of this paper is to explain the concept of global journalism and to describe its presence in the Czech Republic. The development of journalism in the last years, which is connected to globalisation and digitalisation of media, and various global journalism theo-ries are introduced first to give the theoretical background. Then Peter Berglez's theory of global journalism is accepted as the main one for this work and it is described into greater details, including strong and weak points, criticism, problems and challenges. That is the core of the theoretical part of this work. The history and media of the Czech Republic are shortly addressed before the actual research. That is done with the help of mixed methods – quantitative surveys and content analyses and qualitative interviews – to answer four research questions: the awareness about the existence of global journalism, opinions about it, the influence of education and the presence of global journalism in Czech media.