(The Josif Vissarionovič Stalin’s and Klement Gottwald’s Cult of Personality in History School Books in the Museum of Education and Pedagogy Fund)
Abstract: The study deals with the phenomenon of „cult of personality“, that was in the most radical season of communist regime in Czechoslovakia in the years 1948 – 1953 characterized by emphasis on systematic portraying the prominent communist party representatives like infallible and perfect revolutionary heroes. The Marxist conception of communist movement history was in that period deformed by simplification of historical facts with the intention to glorify the political profile of the Soviet dictator Josif Vissarionovič Stalin and the Czechoslovak president Klement Gottwald. In presented text we tried to analyse the ways in which these distortions changed the historical picture of modern world and Czechoslovak history and by this way influenced the process of mastering historical knowledge. We studied the issue of the „cult of personality“ in two selected learning texts. We say concretely about school books from The Museum of Education and Pedagogy in Bratislava: History for IV. high school class and The history of ČSR. Learning text for IV. class of Gymnasiums and Pedagogical Gymnasiums. The systematic praise of the founders and the leaders of communist movement should inspire and motivate to adopt ideologically acceptable attitudes, while Stalin’s and Gottwald’s opponents were shown in exclusively negative connotations. However the cult of personality was not a phenomenon typical only for the era of Stalinism, because his milder forms were the immanent part of communist system.
Author: GABČO Martin
DOI: 10.17846/SHN.2020.24.1.148-171
Publication order reference: Múzeum školstva a pedagogiky, Charkovská 1, 841 07 Bratislava 4, Slovak Republic, mail: martin.gabco@cvtisr.sk
Source: Studia Historica Nitriensia, 2020, vol.: 24, number: 1, pages: 148-171
Key words: Josif Vissarionovič Stalin; Klement Gottwald; Museum of Education and Pedagogy; Soviet Union; Czechoslovakia; Cult of Personality; School Book;
Language: SLOVAK