<abstract>
<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
The main characteristics of any given social group are defined through comparisons with members of other communities and result from a complex interplay. Identity and alterity are thus constructed simultaneously and interdependently in accordance with group representations emerging from various sources: direct contact through travelling, mere legends or more verifiable accounts, scientific or fictional works, press articles tackling diverse topics, school textbooks, almanacs, etc. The British and the Americans were not identified as the most noteworthy alterity figures by the Romanian mentality of the modern period, but they were surely perceived distinctively from other foreigners. Despite the cultural and/or geographical distance between Transylvania, Wallachia and Moldavia, on the one hand, and Great Britain and the United States of America, on the other hand, towards the end of the 19th century average Romanians were able to interwove information gathered from a wide range of sources and to transform it into realistic depictions of these two countries and their inhabitants. This process of defining the Other combined diachronic and synchronous tendencies, fiction and facts, stereotypes and truth. By synthesising the work done by previous researchers, the present study provides an overall image of the ways in which Great Britain and the United States of America were perceived by Romanians throughout the 18th and 19th centuries.
</abstract>

Great Britain and the United States of America as alterity figures for Romanians in the modern epoch: Ethno-cultural images and social representations

Editorial Foreword

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<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
The British sociologist Gerard Delanty’s conception of “boundary and identities of exclusion” in European history shall be remembered when approaching “hard borders.” This concept takes into account the “cultural dynamics of self-identification through exclusion” and is germane when considering the interwar interactions between the countries of the Baltic area and Russia. The works of Reece Jones and Alec Murphy on “the hardening of borders” and “the fetishization of territory” as national traits are equally pertinent to the perception of frontiers during the duration of the 20th century, including the years 1917 to 1922. In every occasion in which war and violence (ultimatums, threats of force) were employed in the Baltic Sea Region to award borders in favor of one state or another or to settle accounts, the arrangements were not permanent and a cycle of warfare with terrible effects on local people followed. The combination of universalist ideologies (such as Communism) with imperial goals frequently resulted in both domestic and international conflicts. Civil unrest (<italic>sisällissota</italic>) and clashes with and between foreign troops (Russian and German) marked Finland’s journey to independence. Comparable conditions existed in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. In each case, the upshot was not just an obsession with boundaries, but also an increase in otherness and loss of life.
</abstract>

The „hard” borders in the Baltic Sea Region, 1917-1922

<abstract>
<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
The geographic distance between Romania and Sweden influenced the creation of mutual imaginary. However, it wasn’t until the beginning of the 20th century that inhabitants of the two nations were interested in discovering each other. Therefore, Romanian-Swedish mutual impressions were mostly based on the accounts of tourists who had visited both nations. During the interwar era, direct contact between Romanians and Swedes was infrequent. The news about Romania was disseminated by the Swedish press, which played a significant part in the formation of hostile sentiments. On the other side, the Romanian diplomats who ran the Stockholm-based Legation had nothing but admiration for Swedish society. During the Second World War, the situation improved as more Romanian and Swedish intellectuals traveled to Scandinavia and the Balkans. However, these interactions did not alter how Romanians and Swedes viewed one another.
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Alterity and identity: Romanian-Swedish mutual perceptions during The Second World War

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<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
This article explores the shifting perspectives of Polish academics about the role of the Orthodox Church in domestic and interstate relations within the Commonwealth and the Russian Empire. Why Poland’s sovereignty crumbled at the end of the 18th century was one of the most critical questions Polish historians sought to explain. Since Bohdan Khmelnytskii’s uprising, Moscow’s geopolitical objectives had placed the Ukrainian territories in the forefront of their attention.
It has been documented that the nineteenth-century Polish scientific research was more concerned with the social and political impact of Orthodox Churches in Commonwealth regions than any other aspect of its history. However, this scenario has altered through time. Since the eighteenth century, the viewpoints of Polish historians have changed drastically. Additionally, they investigated the inner workings of churches and religious activity in Ukraine.
</abstract>

A view from Poland: the state and the Orthodox church in the Ukrainian lands in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as reflected in the Polish historical research

<abstract>
<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
The purpose of this article is that of exploring one of the most valuable sources from Iceland’s golden age of sagas, the Saga of the People of Laxárdalr through the lenses of historical as well as literary criticism in order to provide an account of the ways in which Norwegian kings or queens were portrayed. The research methodology includes primary and secondary source analysis and qualitative analysis, as well as the comparative method, as the results are compared with similar findings from secondary literature. The edition of Laxdæla Saga that was used in the analysis is Muriel A. C. Press’s translation from 1999 and the main secondary sources used include works such as those of Ármann Jakobsson and William Ian Miller. The main findings are that, like in many other similar sources, the Norwegian monarchy is represented either in an either extremely positively or extremely negatively fashion by the author of the saga.
</abstract>

The image of the Norwegian monarch in Laxdæla saga. Historical and philological remarks

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The Romanian Journal for Baltic and Nordic Studies

Revista Română de Studii Baltice și Nordice

The Romanian Journal for Baltic and Nordic Studies (RJBNS) was founded in 2009 as the official publication of the Romanian Association for Baltic and Nordic Studies (ARSBN). The journal...

The Romanian Journal for Baltic and Nordic Studies (RJBNS) was founded in 2009 as the official publication of the Romanian Association for Baltic...