Who Are the Czechs?
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One hundred years of existence of independent Czechoslovakia raises a lot of questions. One of the trickiest ones is: Who are we? Where do we come from and where are we going? Quoting the phrase from the Czech legendary comedy: “a villain or a hero, in one family we belong”. While the world sees us as “the nation of Svejks”, we tend to view ourselves as wimps who always wait what will happen. Which of the two statements is truth and which is just a cliché?

We are launching a new three-year project that will concentrate on the Czech national character. This year’s section, entitled Czechs – Heroes or Villains, will examine how thin is the margin between admiration and reprobation in the Czech society, the next year’s Czechs – The Laughing Beast will be dedicated to laughing, a major Czech national antidepressant, while the third, the 2020 edition called Czechs – The Sissies will deal with our passivity and weaknesses.