Marxist legacies

I conducted office hours in my department office this afternoon for the first time. I share a very large, sun-filled office with two other faculty members who are here on different days.

One end of my office, with sofa and comfortable chairs, does double-duty for department meetings.

The other end of my office, with three desks. Mine is to the right.

I was fascinated with the high-quality old growth teak bookcases and storage units in the office, decidedly higher quality than the IKEA furniture that fills my apartment. (Bratislava has an IKEA store, although I have not yet visited. I’m a fan of their LA stores, but high-end quality is not their forte.) As with so much here, even the furniture has a story. Before the fall of communism in what was then Czechoslovakia in the Velvet Revolution in late 1989, the largest department at Comenius University was the Department of Marxism, with some 80 faculty members in many disciplines, a huge department by any standards. They had the best offices, the best furniture, and apparently the most power all around.

After the fall of Communism, the Department was dissolved and the faculty members scattered. Some had been unhappy hostages to Marxism, but needed to earn a living, and found other work at the University. Some retired. Some moved to parts unknown.

I am hosted this fall by the Department of Ethics and Civic Education, formed in 1990 and allowed to hire 10 faculty members. It inherited some of the old Marxist furniture, which now graces the office I occupy. What tales that teak could tell!

This is a shot of the long hallway for my department, with kitchen, waiting areas for students, restrooms, and faculty offices.

This is a shot skyward of the old marble staircases with classic metal railings in the department office building.