The Sudeten German Experience and its Impact on Present-Day German-Czech Relations

Martha Lacek*

Department of World Languages, Literatures and Linguistics, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV 26506

Presentation Category: Oral-Human Engagement (Oral Presentation #6)

Student’s Major: German Studies and Computer Science

The Czechs and Germans who inhabited the border regions of the modern-day Czech Republic had over 700 years of contentious shared history. The conflict between the two countries reached its pinnacle in the Nazi occupation of the so-called Sudetenland and the subsequent expulsion of ethnic Germans by the Czech government at the end of the war. For many years, exiled Sudeten Germans were silent regarding their displacement after the war, which was both brutal and deadly, because of the culturally instilled acceptance of German culpability for the war. The silence about the expulsion of Germans and their subsequent lives as refugees contributed to a lack of widespread knowledge regarding the Sudetenland and its troubled history during and after the war. The conflicts that took place in the area and the silence about them continue to influence the modern German-Czech relations, which are, in many ways, still troubled. This project examines how the aforementioned historical conflicts have influenced current cultural and political interactions, with both positive and negative outcomes. It sheds light on how crimes of the past, enacted on and by both cultures, continue to impact local and national relations and emphasizes the need for open dialogue about the past in order to improve present-day interactions and official policy.

Funding:

Program/mechanism supporting research/creative efforts: capstone course within my department,