CURRENT POSITION:   Associate Professor, Department of History, Columbia University.

EDUCATION:

            Ph.D.           Stanford University, Department of History (April, 1997)
                                Dissertation: “The Struggle for the Soul of the Nation”:
                                Czech Culture and Socialism 1945-1948.

            M.A.            Stanford University, Department of History (December, 1990).

            B.A.            University of Texas, Plan II Liberal Arts Honors Program (May, 1986).

PUBLICATIONS:     

BOOKS:

“The Struggle for the Soul of the Nation”: Czech Culture and the Rise of Communism. Harvard Cold War Book Series. Oxford/Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2004.

Editor. Prague in the New Central Europe. Prague: Sociological Institute, Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences, 1991.

ARTICLES IN EDITED VOLUMES:

“Allierte Planungen und Entscheidungen zur Nachkriegslösung des deutsch-tschechischen Konflikts.” In: Barbara Coudenhove und Oliver Rathkolb, Hg. Die Beneš-Dekrete. Wien: Czernin Verlag, 2002. 118-29.

“The Marshall Plan and Czechoslovak Democracy: Elements of Interdependency.” In: Martin Schain, ed. The Marshall Plan. Fifty Years After. New York: Palgrave, 2001. 93-116.

“The Price of Retribution: The Trial of Jozef Tiso.” In: István Deák, Jan Gross and Tony Judt, eds. The Politics of Retribution in Europe: World War II and Its Aftermath. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000. 252-89.

“The Czech Republic: Annus Horribilus and Recovery” and “Slovakia: An Isolated and Divided House.” In: Per Jacobsen, ed. Øststatus 1997. København: C. A. Reitzel, 1998.

“Signs of Ill Health for East Europe's ‘Golden Child’?: The Czech Republic in 1996” and “‘Mečiar or Europe’?: Recent Developments in Slovakia.” In: Per Jacobsen, ed. Øststatus 1996. København: C. A. Reitzel, 1997.

“L’existentialisme et la politique tchèque.” In: Dominique Lapierre, ed. Europe 1946: Entre le deuil et l'espoir. Caen: Éditions Complexe, 1996.

ARTICLES IN REFEREED JOURNALS:

“World War Two and the East European Revolution.” In: East European Politics and Societies 16.3 (2002) 623-64.

“Who Lost Czechoslovakia? Reconsidering the Communist Takeover Fifty Years Later.” In: Intermarium 3 (1999). URL: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/sipa/REGIONAL/ECE/intermar.html.
See also http://www.columbia.edu/cu/sipa/REGIONAL/ECE/abrams.pdf.

“The Price of Retribution: The Trial of Jozef Tiso.” East European Politics and Societies 10 (1996) 255-92.

“Die Vertreibung der Sudetendeutschen und die tschechoslowakische Opposition in den 70er Jahren.” Transit. Europaische Revue 10 (1995) 174-93.

“Morality, Wisdom and Revision: The Czech Opposition of the 1970s and the Expulsion of the Sudeten Germans.” East European Politics and Societies 9 (1995) 244-55.

“Leopold Kompert and Fritz Mauthner: Bookends of Bohemian Jewish Identity.” Bohemia (Munich). A Journal of History and Civilisation in East Central Europe 33 (1992) 282-298.

“The Austro-Czech Jewish Intelligentsia of 1848 and the Oesterreichisches Central-Organ fuer Glaubensfreiheit, Cultur, Geschichte und Literatur der Juden.” Bohemia (Munich). A Journal of History and Civilisation in East Central Europe 31 (1990) 1-20.

OTHER RECENT PUBLICATIONS:

Articles on “Václav Nosek” and “Zdenĕk Mlynář” In: The Encyclopedia of the Cold War: A Political, Social and Military History. Edited by Spencer Tucker. Santa Barbara, Denver and Oxford: ABC-CLIO, forthcoming 2006.

Review of Ivan Berend. History Derailed. Central and Eastern Europe in the Long Nineteenth Century. In: Canadian-American Slavic Studies. Publication forthcoming.

Review of Claire E. Nolte. The Sokol in the Czech Lands to 1914. Training for the Nation. New York: Palgrave, 2002. In: The Journal of Modern History. Publication forthcoming.

Review of Stefan Creutzberger und Manfred Görtemaker, hrsg. Gleichschaltung unter Stalin? Die Entwicklung der Parteien im östlichen Europa 1944-1949. Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh, 2002. In: Slavic Review. Publication forthcoming.

Review of Detlef Brandes. Der Weg zur Vertreibung 1938-1945. Pläne und Entscheidungen zum “Transfer” der Deutschen aus der Tschechoslowakei und aus Polen. München: R. Oldenbourg, 2001. In: The Journal of Modern History. Publication forthcoming in 2003.

Review of Jörg K. Hoensch and Hans Lemburg, eds. Begegnung und Konflict. Schlaglichter auf das Verhältnis von Tschechen, Slowaken und Deutschen 1815-1989. Essen: Klartext, 2001. Publication forthcoming in: Zeitschrift für Ostmitteleuropa-Forschung 51/3 (2002) 438-9. Also available online in Sehepunkt 2/9 (2002) at http://www.sehepunkte.historicum.net/2002/09/3898610020.html.

Review of Gernot Heiss, Alena Mišková, Jiří Pešek, and Oliver Rathkolb, eds. An der Bruchlinie. Österreich und die Tschechoslowakei nach 1945 - Na rozhraní světů. Rakousko a Československo po 1945. Innsbruck, Wien: Studienverlag, 1998. In: Austrian History Yearbook. 32 (2001) 315-7.

Review of Miklós Kun. Prague Spring – Prague Fall: Blank Spots of 1968. Budapest: Akadémiai Kaidó, 1999. In: HABSBURG, H-Net Reviews, May, 2000.
URL: http://www.h-net.msu.edu/reviews/showrev.cgi?path=7833958143032.

Review of Deborah Cornelius. In Search of the Nation. Boulder: EEM, 1998. In: Zeitschrift für Ostmitteleuropaforschung 49 (2000) 289-90.

Review of Jaromír Navrátil, chief editor. The Prague Spring 1968. A National Security Archive Documents Reader. Budapest: CEU Press, 1998. In:HABSBURG, H-Net Reviews, June, 1999. URL: http://www.h-net.msu.edu/reviews/showrev.cgi?path=11490928517680

“Victorious February Fifty Years On: Historians Meet in Prague to Discuss the Communist Takeover of Czechoslovakia.” Intermarium 2 (1998).
URL: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/sipa/REGIONAL/ECE/intermar.html.

CONFERENCE ORGANIZING:

Co-organizer (with Oldřich Tůma, Director, Institute for Contemporary History, Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague) of the international conference “The Czechoslovak Political Trials of the 1950s,” 14-5 April, 2003. Created budget, raised funds, contacted participants, acted as chair and discussant, and will oversee multiple-language publication of the conference’s papers

CONFERENCE PAPERS/PUBLIC LECTURES:

"From Marxism to Post-Marxism: Eastern and Western Parallels before 1989." To be delivered at the 35^nd  Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 22 November 2003.

“The Second World War and the Collapse of Czechoslovak Democracy.” Plenary lecture delivered at the National Czech and Slovak Museum and Library’s second semi-annual Czech and Slovak History and Culture Conference, entitled “The Czech and Slovak Twentieth Century in Retrospect: The Decade of Turmoil, 1938-1948.” Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 8 March 2002.

“Josef Tiso and the Weaknesses of Czechoslovak Democracy.” Delivered at the National Czech and Slovak Museum and Library’s second semi-annual Czech and Slovak History and Culture Conference, entitled “The Czech and Slovak Twentieth Century in Retrospect: The Decade of Turmoil, 1938-1948.” Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 8 March 2002.

Roundtable participant, “The Intersection of the Discipline of History and Area Studies,” at the 34^th Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania), 22 November 2002.

“‘Masaryk jde nalevo’: The Battle over Masaryk’s Legacy, 1945-1948.” Delivered at the 32^nd  Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies (Denver, Colorado), 11 November 2000.

“Who Lost Czechoslovakia? ‘Democracy’ and ‘Socializing Democracy’ 1945-1948.” Delivered at the 31^st Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies (Saint Louis, Missouri), 20 November 1999.

“Who Lost Czechoslovakia? Reconsidering the Communist Takeover Fifty Years Later.” Delivered as a Director’s Seminar at the Harriman Institute, Columbia University, on 14 April, 1999.

“Why So Easy? The 'Elegant Takeover' of Czechoslovakia Fifty Years After.” Delivered as a Woodrow Wilson East European Studies Habsburg Seminar on 19 March 1998 at the Woodrow Wilson Center, Washington DC. Comments by H. Gordon Skilling. A summary can be found as Meeting Report #157, “The ‘Elegant Takeover’ in Czechoslovakia.” In: Woodrow Wilson Center East European Studies Newsletter, May-June 1998.

“A Shift in Sensibilities and Generations: 28 October 1918 and 5 May 1945.” Delivered at the conference “Czechoslovakia 1948” (Prague, Czech Republic) 17-21 February 1998. Hosted by the Institute for Contemporary History, Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague.

“A Shift in Czech Intellectual Sensibilities and Generations: Views of 28 October 1918 and 5 May 1945 in the Immediate Aftermath of World War Two.” Delivered at the 29th National Convention of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies (Seattle, Washington), November, 1997.

“Der Existentialismus und tschechische Politik.” Delivered at the conference “Europe 1946: Entre le deuil et l'espoir.” Sponsored by Memorial (Caen). February, 1996.

“Czechs, Slovaks and the Trial of Josef Tiso.” Delivered at the conference “Political Justice in Post-War Europe.” Sponsored by the Institut fur die Wissenschaften vom Menschen (Vienna). November, 1995.                 

“The Czech Intellectual Crisis and the Forging of a Slavic, Socialist Czechoslovakia.” Guest lecture delivered at Indiana University (Bloomington, Indiana). March, 1995.

“The Czech Opposition and the Expulsion of the Sudeten Germans.” Delivered at the conference “Resistance and Collaboration in Europe: Experience, Memory, Myth and Appropriation.” Sponsored by the Institut fur die Wissenschaften vom Menschen (Vienna). September, 1993.

“The Jewish Intelligentsia in Cisleithenia during the Revolution of 1848.” Delivered at the  conference of the Historische Kommision der Sudetenlnder (Bad Wiessee). November, 1989.

PAST POSITIONS AND EXTENDED FELLOWSHIPS:      

            1996-1997:     Amenuensis Teaching and Research Position in Eastern European History; Institute for East European Studies, University of Copenhagen.

1995-1996:      Research Associate; Remarque Institute for European Studies, New York University. New York, New York. Funding provided by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

            7.-12.1994:      Visiting Fellow; Institut fur die Wissenschaften vom Menschen.
Vienna, Austria.

            1993-1994:       American Council of Learned Societies - Joint Committee on Eastern Europe Dissertation Fellowship.

            1992-1993:       American Council of Learned Societies - Joint Committee on Eastern Europe Dissertation Fellowship.

            1990-1991:       Fulbright Fellowship; Prague, Czechoslovakia.

            1986-1990:       University Fellowship; Stanford University. Stanford, California.

            1982-1986:       National Merit Scholarship; University of Texas. Austin, Texas.

LANGUAGES: English, German, Czech, Slovak, Danish and basic Polish.

PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS: American Historical Association, American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies, Association for the Study of Nationalities, Czechoslovak History Conference, Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences in America.

SUBMISSIONS REVIEWER: East European Politics and Societies, Nationalities Papers, The Carl Beck Papers, Journal of Women’s History, Contemporary European History., Canadian Journal of History

MANUCRIPT REVIEWER: Hippocrene Books, Columbia University Press.

WEB PAGE: www.columbia.edu/~bfa4/babrams.html

Send mail to gv36@columbia.edu with questions or comments about this web site.
Last modified: Thursday, September 23, 2004

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