My doctoral dissertation examines the delimitation of the Slovak - Polish border in the interwar period and the impact of the cession of the parts of the Slovak districts in Orava and Spiš to Poland on the relations between Czecho-Slovakia and Poland, Czechoslovakia and Poland, and Slovakia and Poland. The Tešín question dominated the border delimitation and the relations and the Orava and Spiš questions and the delimitation of the Slovak - Polish border received much less scholarly attention. While acknowledging the complexity of the issue under consideration, this work attempts to make small contribution towards filling existing gap in historiography. The majority of research work occurred at the diplomatic archives in Prague, Paris and Warsaw (Archives of the Foreign Ministry, Archives diplomatiques and Archiwum Akt Nowych). Some primary research also took place in Bratislava, Warsaw, Washington and Ottawa. This work seeks to interpret primary sources in an innovative way which demonstrates influence exerted by the Orava and Spiš questions on the relations between Czecho-Slovakia and Poland, Czechoslovakia and Poland, Slovakia and Poland, Slovaks and Poles, Slovaks and Czechs, and Czechs and Poles. Effectiveness of the Orava and Spiš questions to carve out their own constituencies and to communicate the message of their populations were limited or enhanced by contemporary configuration of international and internal factors. The Orava and Spiš border delimitations in the Slovak-Polish border and their consequences for the Slovak-Czech-Polish relations, remain largely neglected by the scholars in the English and French historiographies. The Orava and Spiš border delimitations play an important role in understanding of Slovak-Polish-Czech relations and international relations in the interwar and post World War II periods. The questions posed by examining the Orava and Spiš border delimitations are as relevant in Schengen Europe as they were almost a century ago.

My doctoral dissertation examines the delimitation of the Slovak - Polish border in the interwar period and the impact of the cession of the parts of the Slovak districts in Orava and Spiš to Poland on the relations between Czecho-Slovakia and Poland, Czechoslovakia and Poland, and Slovakia and Poland. The Tešín question dominated the border delimitation and the relations and the Orava and Spiš questions and the delimitation of the Slovak - Polish border received much less scholarly attention. While acknowledging the complexity of the issue under consideration, this work attempts to make small contribution towards filling existing gap in historiography. The majority of research work occurred at the diplomatic archives in Prague, Paris and Warsaw (Archives of the Foreign Ministry, Archives diplomatiques and Archiwum Akt Nowych). Some primary research also took place in Bratislava, Warsaw, Washington and Ottawa. This work seeks to interpret primary sources in an innovative way which demonstrates influence exerted by the Orava and Spiš questions on the relations between Czecho-Slovakia and Poland, Czechoslovakia and Poland, Slovakia and Poland, Slovaks and Poles, Slovaks and Czechs, and Czechs and Poles. Effectiveness of the Orava and Spiš questions to carve out their own constituencies and to communicate the message of their populations were limited or enhanced by contemporary configuration of international and internal factors. The Orava and Spiš border delimitations in the Slovak-Polish border and their consequences for the Slovak-Czech-Polish relations, remain largely neglected by the scholars in the English and French historiographies. The Orava and Spiš border delimitations play an important role in understanding of Slovak-Polish-Czech relations and international relations in the interwar and post World War II periods. The questions posed by examining the Orava and Spiš border delimitations are as relevant in Schengen Europe as they were almost a century ago.

The purpose of this diploma thesis is to cathegorize the Slovak Republic (1938-1945) in the non-democratic regimes typology, primarily with regard to theories of Fascism and regimes in the "grey zone" between Fascism and Authoritarianism. The thesis explains the dynamics of Fascisation in Europe in the mid-war period, and places the Slovak Republic to this context of "the Fascist era". In the practical part, it will be dealt with divisions of the regime internally and in the Hlinka's Slovak People's Party. Based on this, the Slovak regime will be defined as Parafascist. Keywords Fascism; (First) Slovak Republic; Slovak State; Hlinka's Slovak People's Party; Para- Fascism; Hlinka Guard; Jozef Tiso; Alexander Mach

This thesis investigates sociolinguistic variation among highly fluent Slovak-English bilingual women and also long-term immigrants residing in Edinburgh, Scotland. The present study adds to existing literature on urban migratory experiences (Block, 2008; Forsberg, Lundell and Bartning, 2015; Howley, 2015), comparing cross-cultural variation of immigrants' speech with their local peers (Drummond, 2010, 2012; Meyerhoff et al., 2009), by exploring linguistic and social constraints on language attitudes and accent acquisition among bilingual Slovak immigrants. Sociolinguistic interview data were obtained from 32 women, ages 22-46: 20 Slovak immigrants, 8 Edinburgh Scottish participants, and 6 bilingual Slovak teachers of English in Slovakia. By considering linguistic and social factors that influence Slovak immigrants' variation, in this thesis I ask not just whether and to what extent do local language communities shape immigrants' identity, but also how their identity affects their language attitudes and pronunciation. The thesis pays particular attention to how implicit and explicit language attitudes combine to establish what Block (2008) called a "multidimensional" identity in immigrants. Further investigation establishes a link between identity and production (Redinger and Llamas, 2014; Podesva et al., 2015) by drawing on the variationist sociolinguistic methodologies set out by Labov (1966, 2001, 2006). Implicit language attitudes were collected via a Verbal Guise Task (VGT), during which participants evaluated speakers of foreign and native English accents (Campbell- Kibler, 2006; McKenzie, 2015; McKenzie and Carrie, 2018). Explicit attitudes were collected via a questionnaire designed to elicit attitudes in a casual setting (Dörnyei and Csizér, 2012). The combination of methodologies revealed that immigrant participants in the study held complex attitudes and motivations in relation to their host country. The results for language attitudes suggested that long-term Slovak immigrants experienced shifts to their identity while residing in Scotland, with most adopting a transnational identity that made them amenable to local language communities while maintaining connections with their home country. Their identity represented a degree of integration with Scottish communities, but transnational immigrants often felt separate from both home and host countries as a result. The present study also explores connection between identity and production which is now well recognised (Kobiałka, 2016; Regan, 2016; Regan and Ni Chasaide, 2010; Bucholtz, 2011). Immigrant participants' pronunciations of FACE and GOAT vowel lexical sets (Wells, 1982) were evaluated in comparison to two language groups that represented different standards of pronunciation: native Scottish participants in Edinburgh, with more monophthongal pronunciations (Schützler, 2015); and English-Slovak bilinguals residing in Trnava, Slovakia, whose vowel productions were highly diphthongal and similar to Received Pronunciation (RP) constructions. Comparative study of pronunciations revealed that the immigrants' FACE and GOAT realisations were relatively more monophthongal than the non-immigrant Slovak group, yet more diphthongal than the native Scottish group - effectively making immigrant Slovaks' mean pronunciations separate and distinct from both native standard varieties. However, the immigrant's pronunciations varied widely, and data modelling revealed associations between key social factors and pronunciation. Settings of high formality, strong European and Slovak identities, and intentions to return to Slovakia were associated with relatively more diphthongal pronunciations. Decreased formality, strong Scottish identities, and lack of formal education before immigration were associated with relatively more monophthongal pronunciations. Key findings in the study reinforce observations of multi-cultural identities in longterm Slovak immigrants. Drawing on work that explores variation in language attitudes (Clark and Schleef, 2010) and production in migratory settings (Meyerhoff and Schleef, 2014), I argue that there is a tendency for immigrants to shape their multi-cultural identities in response to linguistic and social contexts. However, internal contexts such as self-definition were equally important in shaping identities, which in turn affected language attitudes and pronunciation.

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The topic of this diploma thesis is direct elections of the President of Slovak Republic in context of other Central European countries - particularly Czech Republic and Poland. The subject of my analysis were selected aspects of presidential election, which I analyzed in the third chapter (in case of Slovakia), dedicated to direct elections of Slovak president in 1999, 2004 and 2009; and in the fourth chapter, which is dedicated to last direct election. Among analyzed aspects (in case of Slovak presidential election) a trend of declining interest in the first round of elections was confirmed; also sooner claiming of candidacy, compared with previous elections. The latter fact is connected with longer and longer pre-election campaign, which is also more and more personal and offensive. The ratio of partisan and non-partisan candidates was in all elections about the same (approx. 3:2 in favor of partisan candidates). In the fifth chapter of the thesis I analyzed these aspects in case of direct presidential elections in Poland and Czech Republic. Then, I compared them. According to analysis, women in Poland almost were not standing for president at all (there were even fewer women candidates than in Slovakia), but in Poland we can see much higher number of very prominent candidates (especially former...

Institutional Arbitration The thesis deals with fundamental issues relating to both institutional arbitration and also arbitration in general. The aim of this thesis is to explain the basic aspects of arbitration and analyze and evaluate recent legal changes made in the field of arbitration in the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. The thesis is composed of an introduction, three chapters and a conclusion. After an introduction, where I outline the reasons that led me to choose this topic and I set the objectives of this thesis, followed the first chapter, which acquaint the reader with the basic institutes of arbitration. Its parts discusses about definition of arbitration, its history, the four main theoretical concepts of arbitration and the different types of the arbitration. Subsequently this chapter defines arbitrability and arbitration agreement (fundamental conditions for arbitration). The conclusion of this chapter is dedicated to the principles of arbitration and the comparison of the advantages and disadvantages of arbitration. The second chapter is specifically concerned with the recent changes in the regulation of arbitration in the Czech Republic. The main part of this chapter is dedicated to the Euro-amendment of Act No. 216/1994 Coll., on Arbitration and Enforcement of Arbitral...

RULCOVÁ, Simona. The transformation of identity of Slovak minority after 1989 - The social integration in the Czech Republic. Praha: Faculty of Arts, Charles University, 2015. 144 pp. Master Degree Thesis. The Slovak minority is considered to be the most integrated minority in the Czech Republic. The work offers an analysis of the cultural diversity, focusing on the Slovak minority and the transformation of its identity. It summarizes examples of the social integration of Slovaks in the Czech Republic and assesses its role in a real life. The Slovak question in the Czech environment is also presented in a historical perspective, but the main emphasis is put on the analysis of current situation. The work is complemented by own filed research that it maps the real situatiton of transformations of identity and the social integration of the representatives of the Slovak minority, including the functionality of the institution which deals with the integration of the Slovak minority. Keywords: identity, Slovak ethnic minority, integration, Czech Republic, migration

The thesis is of an analytical/interpretative character, focusing on paradigmatic analysis of the motives, images, symbols and allusions in the works of Slovak novelist Stanislav Rakús. The object of the analysis is the short story collection Pieseň o studničnej vode, first published in 1979. The multilayeredness of Rakús's texts urges the reader to search for different interpretative possibilities. The language of images, symbols and allusions affects not only the motivic and expressive structure of the text, but also e.g. the temporal and spatial identification of the stories, and in a specific manner it also affects the narrative situation implied. The thesis focuses on detailed analysis of individual layers of the literary texts.

In the pre-lacation, lactation and post-lactation periods in 2010 and 2011 and the pre-lactation period in 2012 we used radio-telemetry to determine changes in home range and habitat activity and preference of the maternity colony of the Mediterranean horseshoe bat (Rhinolophus euryale) in Slovak Karst. The colony roosted in the attic of the monastery in Jasov. This area represents the northern margin of the species distribution range. In total, we tagged 35 females that were radio-tracked for 31 nights. For the all pre- lactation periods 17 females were marked, in the lactation periods 12 females were marked, and 6 females were marked in the post-lactation periods. The females were marked with radiotags and the VHF telemetry (radio telemetry using very high frequencies) was used. We compared the spatial and habitat preferences in the above defined seasons of the annual reproductive cycle. The total number of recorded locations was 858 for all reported periods. We compared the varios aspects of activity of the females during the night in the particular periods. We have shown that the females left their roost in the pre-lactation periods as the most late. These were followed by the females in the lactation periods and as the most early after the sunsetthe roost was left by the females in the...