Church, Habitus and Cultural Memory in Carinthia

Content: According to several surveys, church attendance and trust in the Catholic Church are lower in Carinthia than in other Austrian federal states. In the present study, this fact is related to political and social developments that have earned Carinthia the reputation as an exceptional historical case. Experts point for example to Carinthian election results, the minority conflict, or to the high rates of illegitimate children. They all seem to be somehow connected with the percpetion of the Catholic Church. Similar to the recurrent term of the Carinthian soul, these circumstances are the expression of a regional and social formed structure of personality, for which the sociological term habitus is used. Habitus is always the outcome of historical long-term developments. In examination of important historical stages in Carinthian (church-)history, those developments are outlined in chapter one. The second chapter examines the attitude towards the church in Carinthia during the austrofascist era from 1933/34 to 1938. The authoritarian regime of Dollfuß and Schuschnigg gained important support by the Catholic Church a fact that influenced the low acceptance of the regime in Carinthia, too. On the contary, the illegal National Socialist Movement gained huge popularity during those years. These connections are presented as the outcome of the developments outlined in chapter one. An examination of so far unpublished archive material, in which Carinthian clergymen report their experiences with the apostate-movement during this period, is the core part of this chapter. In the third chapter, particular facets of the Carinthian habitus are illustrated by text and image samples from arts, literature, and historiography. Therefore, seven traditions of remembrance that mainly were formed in the interwar period are analyzed. Most of them are still an important part of cultural memory until today. In the summary, seven dimensions of the Carinthian habitus and their impact on the attitude towards the church are outlined and the most important insights are summed up. What is new/special? Regarding the analysis of so far unpublished archive documents, this study presents new insights into the years prior to the Anschluss an extraordinary important historical period that receives not much attention in Carinthian history. Furthermore, its comprehensive historical and cultural overview enables to understand and interpret developments that are still important today.

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