Cultural Studies paper by Horgos, Bonnie - University of Minnesota

‘De ma már úgy isznak, mint az apjuk’: A Pilot Qualitative Study of Hungarian-American Women and Alcohol Use

Abstract
Hungary has one of the highest rates of alcohol use disorder (AUD) and rates of mortality from liver cirrhosis in the world. Research shows there is a correlation between AUD and intergenerational trauma across all cultures, yet there is little research that assesses the impact of intergenerational trauma within the Hungarian-American community and how it contributes to AUD. Given the impact of Hungary’s historical events such as the Hungarian Revolution of 1848, the Treaty of Trianon, and the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, this is a critical issue. Furthermore, rates of AUD continue to rise in women, yet this is largely unexplored in Hungarian-American women. This pilot project explores how Hungarian-American women’s perceptions of alcohol use, misuse, and disorder may be shaped by intergenerational trauma, as well as Hungarians’ cultural practices around alcohol. These customs include the portrayal of alcohol as medicine, the omnipresence of alcohol in childhood, drinking as a social activity, and the overall normalization of alcohol in everyday life. Furthermore, these perceptions may be shaped by the extreme portrayals of AUD in Hungary, as well as gender roles surrounding alcohol. As consumption of alcohol continues to rise in women, future research must investigate Hungarian-American women’s potential increased risk of AUD, as well as culturally relevant clinical interventions.

Brief Professional Bio
Bonnie Horgos, MSW, LGSW is a second-year PhD student in Social Work at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Her research focuses on how gender and culture impact Hungarian-American women's perceptions of alcohol use, misuse, and disorder. She is a licensed graduate social worker with clinical experience in co-occurring substance and alcohol use disorders, intergenerational trauma, gender-based violence, and mass incarceration. In addition to her studies, Bonnie works for the University of Minnesota's Department of Psychiatry and the University of Minnesota’s Office of Institutional Research, Assessment, and Policy Analysis

History/Political Science paper by Kovács, Bálint - Sapientia Hungarian University of Transylvania

The Opportunity of Cultural Autonomy for Hungarians in Romania

Abstract
Cultural or non-territorial autonomy appears as a less invasive, less confrontative way of addressing the wants of national minorities. This legal construct addresses a large number of the main worries minorities have regarding the preservation and evolution of their language and culture, which is why the paper argues that its introduction in Romania would solve a number of current challenges in areas such as mother tongue education, the functioning of cultural institutions, from press and literature to theatres and other artistic institutions.
The lack of such a framework in Romania is baffling, especially in view of the fact that a number of its neighbors have adopted cultural autonomy (Serbia and Hungary), or have at least tried to (Ukraine). In wider East Central Europe, we see that cultural autonomy has a history going back at least a century, so there has been sufficient experimentation with the idea to shape it in accordance with local specificities.
The paper presents some of the main lessons today’s cultural autonomy frameworks provide, and proceeds to present the legislative proposal submitted almost two decades ago by the Hungarian political representation in front of the Romanian Parliament. In a comparative view, it will address the strengths and deficiencies of the proposal, as well as the reasons behind decision-makers’ reluctance to address the proposal on its merits.

Brief Professional Bio
I am a PhD student at the University of Debrecen, and my main topic of research is in the field of international investment arbitration. 
Since 2017 I’ve been a teaching assistant at at Sapientia EMTE, in Kolozsvár, teaching International Economic Law.
Since 2022 I’ve been a visiting lecturer at the University of Miskolc, teaching International Commercial Arbitration to LLM students.
I am the founder of Advocacy Group for Freedom of Identity, a grassroots human rights organization, taking a practical approach to minority right matters by defending discrimination cases in front of the courts.

History/Political Science paper by Leech, Patrick - Baylor University, Texas

Üdvözöljük az Egyesült Államokban: A Hungarian Diaspora Response to the Hungarian Refugee Crisis, 1956-1957 (Accepted)

Abstract
This paper investigates the response of the Hungarian diaspora to efforts by the US government to transport, process, and resettle over 38,000 Hungarian refugees and parolees in the months immediately following the failed uprising by drawing upon a collection of Hungarian-language diaspora newspapers. The diaspora community would serve two critical functions during this process: translation and integration. These publications provide insights into the recruitment of Hungarian speakers, and the broader Hungarian diaspora, to participate in the processing, resettlement, and integration of newly arrived Hungarian refugees and parolees. As such, this paper reveals how local communities participated in national policy initiatives while also showing how US foreign policies affected domestic communities.

Brief Professional Bio
Patrick is a History PhD Candidate at Baylor University studying the global Cold War and its effects, particularly in Hungary and Eastern Europe. His dissertation focuses on the formation of political identities among Hungarian refugees in the United States following the 1956 Uprising. These individuals experienced life on both sides of the Iron Curtain and developed a variety of relationships within the Hungarian diaspora, with US policymakers, and with Hungary.

Cultural Studies paper by Lengyel, Zsanett - University of Debrecen, Debrecen, Hungary

The Hungarian Museum Area during the Quarantine Culture - Core and Peripheral Cultural Industrial Mechanisms

Abstract
During my research paper, I focus on the impact of technology, digital rearrangement, and digital development on museums- I review the previously peripheral segment of the cultural industry, operating with a different mechanism from the core cultural industrial logic - David Hesmondhalgh's work (titled The Cultural Industries) is my theoretical starting point.

I apply the mentioned framework to the solutions of the quarantine culture. (1) I overview the field of museum which is focusing on emerging new types of solutions, and it shows the new museum pedagogy’s solutions as well. (2)During my presentation I give a picture of an „aggressive”, non-organically developed media mediation in the field of museum. My samplings comes from the analysis of the practices of the Hungarian cultural scene. I analyze the new solutions which particularry appeared during the quarantine culture, during the pandemic: I focus on presence, I summarize virtual exhibition’s solutions and practices. After the theoretical framework, and sampling, I discuss my main thesis: the peripheral cultural segment found its practices to join the core cultural segment’s operation with the help of the non-organic media presence. (3)

Brief Professional Bio
Zsanett Lengyel is currently a student of the Doctoral School of Literary and Cultural Studies at the University of Debrecen. There, she earned a communicator degree and then, at Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design, she earned a design and art theorist degree in 2020, futhermore, she became a design and art manager in 2022. She has tearching and research experience. In her researchers, she deals with different aspects cultural studies withing theatre and museums. She has earned many research sholarships during the past 8 years.

History/Political Science paper by Hermann, Gabriella - Corvinus University of Budapest

Nation Concept of the American Hungarian Emigration, with Special Regard to the Situation of Hungarians Living in Romania

Abstract
The lecture focuses on the nation concept of American Hungarian Diaspora organizations and its leaders who advocated human rights of Hungarians living in Romania in the U.S. during the Cold War, taking into consideration both their relationship to the motherland and their position on Hungarian minorities living beyond the borders of Hungary. Each of the organization and movement established by the different waves of immigration in different periods represented a special community culture and mentality, mostly competing with each other, based on imported values from the motherland, and as a consequence, all of them developed their own special nation concept regarding Hungary, its neighboring countries and their Hungarian minorities. This left a strong mark on their chosen advocacy objectives, lobbying instruments, quality of their networks and of their relationship with the prevailing Hungarian Government. The advocacy activities of four different diaspora organizations will be analyzed along the factors mentioned above: namely the points of view and main features of the American Hungarian Federation, American Transylvanian Association, the Transylvanian World Federation and the Hungarian Human Rights Foundation.

Brief Professional Bio
Gabriella Hermann owns master’s degrees in International Relations (from Corvinus University of Budapest, Hungary) and in Ethnography (from Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary). Being a PhD candidate at Corvinus University of Budapest’s International Relations Multidisciplinary Doctoral School, she has specialized on ethnic advocacy activities of Hungarian Diaspora organizations in the U.S. for Hungarian minorities living in Romania during the Cold War, which led her to apply for a Fulbright scholarship at Rutgers University, New Brunswick (NJ), where she spends her research stay in 2019.

Language/Literature paper by Hovanyi, Marton - Yale University

The Problem of the Notion of Modernity in the Contemporary History of Literature in Hungary and beyond

Abstract
The Hungarian history of literature and within it the term for the period of so-called modernity has generated several debates in the last three decades. The Hungarian literary periodization, on the one hand, has tried to find starting points in international literature; on the other hand, it has attempted to describe 20th-21st-century Hungarian literary fiction by such scientific neologisms as, for example, György Tverdota’s term of ‘tradition-preserving modernity’ (hagyományőrző modernség. The aim of my paper is, after briefly outlining the stakes of the debate developed so far and getting to the historical root of the terminological question, to find a way out of the difficulties of periodization of literature and other arts. In order to achieve this, broadening the starting point taken from Hungarian literary studies in concentric circles, I will first review comparative literature, then other branches of the art of the age, and finally, with the help of considerations across disciplinaries, I will look outside humanities. According to my thesis, the changes started in the middle of the 19th century in both Hungarian and international literature have been strongly interrelated with other aspects of culture and civilization. A common term for these changes is necessary because of the aspect of periodization and possible due to the existing common traits; however, it cannot be ‘modernity’. This is why, considering a long 20th century, due to the emphasis on relations and relativity, I suggest introducing the notion of ‘relationism’.

Brief Professional Bio
Literary theorist and theologian. He received his first Ph.D. degree (2017) from the Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE) in literature. He received his Licentiate of Sacred Theology (2017) from the Pázmány Péter Catholic University (PPKE). Now he is a Ph.D. candidate at PPKE and a senior lecturer at ELTE. He carried out research work in Belgium (K.U. Leuven) and in the U.K. (University of Oxford). He published his first book entitled Prophetic Counterparts in The Brothers Karamazov in 2015. Currently, he is a Visiting Research Fellow at Yale University. 

History/Political Science paper by Mervay, Matyas - New York University

Hungarians Talk Homeward from the Celestial Empire: Voices in the Hungarian Press on China and the Chinese

Abstract
This paper deals with the creation, transmission and application of stereotypic images of a country and its people by agents of a traditionally non-colonial state in the period of imperialism. By exploring the representation of China and the Chinese in the Hungarian-speaking press between 1869 and 1904, I have two purposes in mind. On the one hand I intend to contribute to the understanding of the emerging Hungarian Orientalism and Sinology as well as its place in the broader Euro-American discourses. On the other hand I am focusing on a phenomenon of talking about relevant issues at home under the disguise of the otherized foreign. In this paper I am introducing the concept of “homeward-talking”, and the reasons of its application in the Sino-Hungarian context.
Sources include reports from and news about a traveler-scientist writing about the status of Asian women, the accounts of a custom officer describing various aspects of Chinese life, two missionaries operating in turbulent periods, and a technocrat engineer of many superficial and biased ideas about China. I argue that all these individuals were largely part of the coeval Western discourses on China while partly had their own, specific topics for their Hungarian readers.

Brief Professional Bio
Mátyás Mervay earned his BA in history at the Eötvös Lóránd University (Budapest, Hungary) and his master’s degree at Nankai University (Tianjin, China), majoring in modern and contemporary Chinese history. His master’s thesis dealt with Austro–Hungarian prisoners of war in China during World War I. He is currently a doctoral student in East Asian history at New York University. His first article, co-authored with Jiang Pei, “Yizhan qijian zai Zhongguo de Ao Xiong zhanfu” (Austro–Hungarian Prisoners of War in China during World War I), dealing with the reception of the refugee soldiers as well as the detention of the Austro–Hungarian garrison forces in Beijing and Tianjin, was published in Lishi jiaoxue (History Teaching), no. 5 (2017). His second article on the “Austro-Hungarian refugee soldiers in China” was published in July 2018 by the Journal of Modern Chinese History (2018). He is currently preparing his dissertation proposal with a working title: "Central European Diasporas in China 1910s-1950s".

Cultural Studies paper by Csorba, Mrea - University of Pittsburgh

Ancient Diaspora: Evidence of an Iron Age Migrant at Zöldhalompuszta, 5200 Kilometers from Home

Abstract
This paper contextualizes the historic diaspora of Iron Age peoples across the vast Eurasian steppe by analyzing the source and diffusion of three steppe motifs associated with gold objects recovered from the Zöldhalompuszta burial in the Carpathian Basin of Eastern Hungary. In earlier papers I investigated the source and ubiquitous spread of the stag motif featured as a shield ornament in the Hungarian burial. Subsequently I analyzed the motif of a stylized raptor head attached to the alert ear of the Zöldhalompuszta stag. In this last stage of research I analyze the source of a third motif – profiled images of lions also found in the burial. The evidence of the triad of motifs fits within a pattern of diffusion of steppe imagery emanating out of Southern Siberia in the seventh and 6th centuries BCE fanning east and west into the peripheral areas of the Eurasian steppes up the Danube delta into Central Europe and into East Asia along the Amur River. Analysis of the cache of artifacts from Zöldhalompuszta suggests the physical presence of a migrating group from the Arzhan region of Southern Siberia. On the basis of its preserved content, the burial represents the movement of steppe people some 5200 kilometers from home.

Brief Professional Bio
Mrea Csorba Ph.D. I received all three of he academic degrees from the University of Pittsburgh-. She has been teaching courses in art history at the University of Pittsburgh and Duquesne University as an adjunct faculty member since the early 90’s. Her MA thesis (1987) investigated horse-reliant cultures associated with Scythian steppe culture. For her Ph.D. (1997) she expanded research of pastoral groups to non-Chinese dynastic populations documented in northern China. Part of this research was published in the British prehistory journal ANTIQUITY, Cambridge, England (ANTIQUITY 70, 1996, 564—587). Her research may be viewed at http://edtech.msl.duq.edu/Mediasite/Play/2ea00c36fc2b4050ba46072efc0b80111d
and at http://www.duq.edu/academics/schools/liberal-arts/centers/interpretive-and-qualitative-research/video mrc25@pitt.edu

History/Political Science paper by Gombos, Taylor - New York University

Contested Subjects Across Cold War Frontiers: Hungarian Refugees from 56'

Abstract
Although the Cold War has often been depicted in terms of bipolarity, and disconnection, more recent scholarship has sought to underline the various ways the Iron Curtain was in fact a porous boundary. Thus, I have set out to demonstrate in this paper the ways the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 functioned not only as a moment of political upheaval within Hungary itself, but also as a moment of contact between West and East. Mainly, I argue that Hungarian political refugees became contested subjects in the wider Cold War. For propagandists on both sides of the Iron Curtain they often functioned as props in broader ideological contests. Their intermediary and profoundly liminal status made them valuable commodities in the Cold War contest, but also rendered them potentially subversive and destabilizing. As such, they played central roles in challenging Cold War imaginaries, but they were also employed to re-inscribe psychologically satisfying narratives which had been temporarily disrupted by the Revolution. Thus, confronted with the destabilizing trans-border experience of the political refugee, Western and Hungarian ideologues sought to re-inscribe onto these contested bodies pre-conceived notions of the Cold War “other.” Instead of amending their existing imaginaries to agree with reality, they sought to resuscitate older Cold War fantasy. Michel-Rolph Trouillot’s pithy maxim bears mentioning here: “When reality does not coincide with deeply held beliefs, human beings tend to phrase interpretations that force reality within the scope of these beliefs. They devise formulas to repress the unthinkable and to bring it back within the realm of accepted discourse.” Using primarily newspaper articles from the time, but also cinematic and satirical sources I answer two interrelated questions in this paper: 1) how Hungarian political refugees challenged imaginary conceptions of the Cold War “other” by the mere fact of their origins, and 2) how governments on either side of the Iron Curtain sought to reassert ideological control over the destabilizing issues raised be refugees?

Brief Professional Bio
Taylor Gombos is currently a Ph.D. student in History at New York University, working with Larry Wolff. He studys Modern Central and Eastern European history as well as the Austro-Hungarian Empire and its successor states, with a special interest in Hungary. Thematically, he is interested in Cold War imaginaries, and the history of science and technology. Before coming to NYU, Gombos completed an MA in “Central European History” at Central European University in Budapest and spent another year teaching in Hungary. Prior to his MA at CEU he completed an interdisciplinary MA in the “Social Sciences” at the University of Chicago. tjg353@nyu.edu