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Full-Text Articles in European Languages and Societies

Women In Swiss Politics, Verena Grendelmeier Feb 1987

Women In Swiss Politics, Verena Grendelmeier

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

You all know that Switzerland is that strange, little country in the centre of Europe. It is the place, where cheese has tremendous holes; where the snow-white Alps compete with dark brown mountains of chocolate; where every aborigine keeps his alphorn under the bed and every morning gets up - yodelling - and then, punctually, after a critical glance at his watches (and swatches that cover his left arm up to the elbow and beyond) hurries to his place of work - (you guessed it) - the bank, of course. Above all else it is the country that pretends being …


Media And Politics, Verena Grendelmeier Feb 1987

Media And Politics, Verena Grendelmeier

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

Who governs Switzerland? ls our country run by the politicians or is it run by the media? To make this clear right away: The answer is, neither by the one nor by the other, as I hope my expose, by assessing the relative roles of politics and politicians and of the media, will demonstrate.


Book Review: The Essence Of Swissness: A Special Issue Of The Times Literary Supplement, Leo Schelbert Feb 1985

Book Review: The Essence Of Swissness: A Special Issue Of The Times Literary Supplement, Leo Schelbert

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

The Friday, December 7, 1984, issue of the London Times Literary Supplement was devoted in good part to works about Switzerland and its unique literary and historical traditions. It opens with a challenging essay by George Steiner who raises the question "What is Swiss?" "The Writer may speak against the grain," he cautions, "even when he bears close witness. Ten years are, as I have found, too short a time in which to get to know the palimpsest of Genevan society, let alone those of Switzerland." Yet he offers courageously and with much insight his "impressions as to the nature …


Book Review: One Small Lifetime, Leo Schelbert Feb 1985

Book Review: One Small Lifetime, Leo Schelbert

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

To do justice to this moving memoir is less than easy. It presents the story of two intertwined lives, that of Amalia Thurkauf-Braun who was born in the 1880s and that of her son Ernst Albert, born in 1907 at Liestal, the capital of Canton Basel-Land, in Switzerland. The lives of Ernst's father Emil Thurkauf, in contrast, and of Ernst 's three siblings come only occasionally into view from the perspective of Amalia Thurkauf's reports or of her son's autobiographical reminiscences. Both records are touching documents that tell of unusual endurance, of sincere faith, and of incredible capacity for work. …


Iv. Maurice E. Perret's Les Colonies Tessinoises: A Summary View, H. F. Raup Nov 1984

Iv. Maurice E. Perret's Les Colonies Tessinoises: A Summary View, H. F. Raup

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

Recently a major contribution to the field of knowledge of California's diverse population was published in Switzerland by Dr. Maurice-Edmond Perret, with the title Les Colonies Tessinoises en Californie.1 Unlike most studies of a similar nature, Perret had access to source materials in the Swiss archives as well as to those in California libraries.2 But he went further: he conducted his study by means of actual field investigation both in Switzerland and in California, and it is this which gives his work particular interest to historical geographers.


Iii. Strangers Settling A Wild Land: Mari Sandoz' Writings About Swiss Settlers In Nebraska, Marianne Burkhard Nov 1983

Iii. Strangers Settling A Wild Land: Mari Sandoz' Writings About Swiss Settlers In Nebraska, Marianne Burkhard

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

On my first trip West, from the corn plains of Illinois to California and back, Nebraska was the first state with a physiognomy really distinct from the green fields I had come to know. Although there were many spectacular landscapes to be admired during the trip, the grassy hills of Western Nebraska, round and treeless, stayed in my memory. So did the sunflowers, lining the roads and swaying gently in the grass. Little did I know then that, years later, this rather bare, monotonous country would hold my imagination through literary works of women, Willa Cather and Mari Sandoz. With …


Review: Randall M. Miller, Ed., 'A Warm & Zealous Spirit': John J. Zubly And The American Revolution, A Selection Of His Writings. Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press, 1982. Xii, 211 Pp., Leo Schelbert Nov 1983

Review: Randall M. Miller, Ed., 'A Warm & Zealous Spirit': John J. Zubly And The American Revolution, A Selection Of His Writings. Macon, Georgia: Mercer University Press, 1982. Xii, 211 Pp., Leo Schelbert

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

This edition of the religio-political writings of Johann Joachim Zublin (1724-1781) is a valuable and welcome addition to Swiss Americana. John J. Zubly, as he came to be known in the American colonies, had grown up in St. Gallen, Switzerland, where he studied for the ministry. He was ordained in the German Reformed Church of London in 1744 and then moved to South Carolina. His writings which were published after 1760 touch upon vital questions of the years 1760 to 1780, years that saw the transformation of the thirteen continental North American British colonies into a nascent league of states …


Iv. Fond Memories Of Christmas At Home, Agnes F. Hostettler Nov 1982

Iv. Fond Memories Of Christmas At Home, Agnes F. Hostettler

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

Dr. Agnes Hostettler, a member of our society, is professor of German at East Carolina University in Greenville, North Carolina. This article is reprinted by permission from Gardens for All, V, No. 12 (December 1982), 180 Flynn Avenue, Burlington, VT 05401.


Iii. Switzerland And The Era, Hanna Widrig Nov 1982

Iii. Switzerland And The Era, Hanna Widrig

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

A little over a year ago the Swiss voters surprised the world with the acceptance of a referendum that added an equal rights amendment to the Swiss Federal Constitution. Is there an explanation for this sudden change of the rather conservative Swiss heart? Why was it that the Swiss equal rights amendment passed within the short span of ten years after Swiss women got the right to vote, when American women who have been enfranchised since 1921 were unsuccessful in the same pursuit? What was the Swiss strategy for this outcome, and what has been done in the past year …


Ii. Karl Herzog, The Historian As Activist: An Episode From The Time Of The Sonderbund, Sabine Jessner Nov 1982

Ii. Karl Herzog, The Historian As Activist: An Episode From The Time Of The Sonderbund, Sabine Jessner

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

The Swiss historian Karl Herzog was one of the innumerable middle-class intellectuals who exercised an influential role on European liberal politics in the first half of the nineteenth century. Many scholars have analyzed the participation of the bourgeoisie in political life, and they reach novel definitions concerning membership of this intellectual group within the middle class. Historians such as Robert R. Palmer, Alfred Cobban, L.C.B. Seaman and Lenore O'Boyle have devoted particular attention to this concern. For example, the British historian Seaman has cautioned his readers to substitute the expression "professional classes" or "liberal professions" wherever he encounters the word, …


Swiss American News Notes Jan 1982

Swiss American News Notes

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

This past summer Dr. Martin Steinmann, expert on Paleography and Director of the Manuscript Division of the University Library of Basel, Switzerland, directed the Third Summer Institute in the Archival Sciences at the Newberry Library of Chicago. Professor Steinmann is the Swiss representative of the International Committee on Paleography and is an internationally recognized expert on German handwriting of the Renaissance and early modern period, as well as the history of printing. His publications include the catalogue of manuscripts of the University of Basel (co-editor), the articles "Die humanistische Schrift und die Anfänge des Humanismus in Basel,"Archiv für Diplomatik …


Swiss Literature, Heinz K. Meier Jan 1982

Swiss Literature, Heinz K. Meier

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

Switzerland has a rich literary tradition. In modern times both the German- and the French-speaking regions have produced important writers who left distinctive marks on the literature and culture of their time. The 18th century was a time of literary florescence in Switzerland. Important writers of that period include the Bernese patrician Albrecht von Haller (1708-77), whose long poem Die Alpen (1729; The Alps) extols the beauty and grandeur of nature; Johann Jokob Bodmer (1698-1783) and Johann Jakob Breitinger (1701-66) of Zurich, who helped free German literature from the confines of rigid rules; Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712- 78), "citizen of Geneva," …


Emigration: New Beginning Or Premature End? A Book Review, Heinz K. Meier Feb 1979

Emigration: New Beginning Or Premature End? A Book Review, Heinz K. Meier

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

Why were certain experiments of planned emigrati.0n crowned with success while others ended in dismal failure? What went wrong in one case and turned out well in the other? What were the factors that determined the outcome of such experiments? These and similar questions arise in reading and comparing two small books, published last year in Switzerland, that deal with the history of two different emigration ventures from Switzerland to the United States of America


Letter From The President, Leo Schelbert Oct 1976

Letter From The President, Leo Schelbert

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

The Annual Meeting of the Swiss American Historical Society will be held this year at the Embassy of Switzerland in Washington, D.C. Ambassador and Mrs. Dr. Raymond Probst have moreover most generously invited the participants to a luncheon at their residence. May I kindly urge you to attend this meeting which will enable you not only to shape the affairs of the Society, but also to meet with Ambassador and Mrs. Probst at their residence and to renew many personal contacts.


The Swiss In Hawaii, Niklaus R. Schweizer May 1976

The Swiss In Hawaii, Niklaus R. Schweizer

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

SWITZERLAND AND HAWAII, at first glance, seem to have little to do with each other and any connection appears coincidental. A high government official in Honolulu recently was of that opinion and many would have readily corroborated his notions.


Major Sources Of Genealogical Information, Paul Anthon Nielson A. G. Nov 1972

Major Sources Of Genealogical Information, Paul Anthon Nielson A. G.

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

Genealogical research in Switzerland is unique in many aspects because of several national characteristics. The physical terrain and political neutrality of Switzerland have virtually withstood the plagues of war which have ravaged the continent. Four offical languages - German, French, Italian, and Romansch - are spoken in many dialects by the Germanic and Latin peoples who are united through the Swiss Confederation. Caatholicism and the protestant Swiss Reformed Church are two predominant religions. Finally, and perhaps most important of all, Swiss rights of citzenship (Heimatberechtigung) are based on the medieval form jus sanguinis, the lineage of an individual.


Reprint: From The International Migration Review, Leo Schelbert Dec 1969

Reprint: From The International Migration Review, Leo Schelbert

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

The Swiss American Historical Society (SAHS) is a reslative newcomer among the organizations which are dedicated to the historical study of a particular ethnic group. It was founded on July 4 , 192, in order "to meet the growing demand for a comprehensive account of the role which the Swiss element ... has played in the history of this country."


Europe's Contribution To American Civilization, Alfred Zehnder Apr 1965

Europe's Contribution To American Civilization, Alfred Zehnder

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

You have invited me to speak about Switzerland's contribution to American civilization. This is quite a task. I don't intend to give you today a complete study on this subject. You will see later why. Switzerland is not only a small country in the heart of Europe, but it is Europe. And Europe is Switzerland. It is impossible to determine exactly what part in the Swiss contribution is genuine Swiss, and what part is European. That is why I would like to invite you to try with me to discover the great ideas and the fact s which ought to …


High-School Teachers Shortage Of 600 In Switzerland In 1975 Apr 1965

High-School Teachers Shortage Of 600 In Switzerland In 1975

Swiss American Historical Society Newsletter

The "Standige Komrnission Gymnasium-Universitat" in Zurich has asked to distribute among Swiss intellectuals abroad the enclosed fact sheet followed by a form for a non-committal application for a teaching-post during a probationary period at a Swiss High School.