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Of: TT
Published:
February 1 | Photo: Marton Monus / MTI via AP / TT
Theater and film students form a human chain in Budapest in a protest action against the growing influence of the government on culture and education. The photo was taken on September 6.
Students occupy school buildings, teachers go on strike and thousands of protesters form human chains in Budapest.
They accuse the Hungarian government of taking political control of cultural education and, by extension, the Hungarian film and theater industry.
During the summer, the government of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán decided that the prestigious University of Cinema and Theater in Budapest would no longer be run by the state. Instead, it will run in the form of a foundation, where the government appoints all members who can decide on issues of employment, budgets and curricula.
In early September, around a hundred students from the school decided to occupy one of the school buildings in protest at what they see as a veritable inauguration. The new board was told that it would not be admitted until the independence of the university was printed.
“It is a very deliberate and determined culture war that Viktor Orbán is waging,” student union leader Mihály Csernai told The New York Times.
“New way of thinking”
Orbán and the ruling Fidesz party have long fought against institutions that they have condemned as policies and values that in their eyes are too leftist or liberal. And then the cultural institution that nurtured several of Hungary’s leading film and theater stars has been a special red curtain.
The newly appointed chairman of the university board, Attila Vidnyánszky, says he is open to dialogue, but also states that he wants “new ways of thinking” at the university and that therefore existing courses will have a greater focus on patriotism and Christianity, writes the BBC.
Filmmaker Ildiko Enyedi, whose film “In Body and Soul” (2017) won the best film award at the Berlin International Film Festival and was nominated for an Oscar, has resigned from her teaching position at the school. She informed her students that she had “foolishly hoped that common sense and respect for university traditions would have some meaning and that the independence of the university would be maintained,” according to Reuters.
Patriotic education
The Orbán government has previously expanded its influence over the world of theater by gaining more voice in the supply and financing of state theaters. It has also increased control over higher education, has introduced a national curriculum with patriotic elements, and has changed, above all, education in history and literature. The explicit goal is for students to learn to be “proud of the history of their people.”
In connection with the occupation of school buildings, thousands of people gathered in the capital, Budapest, to protest against government intervention. They formed a human chain of about five kilometers long from the campus to the parliament and sent a document formulating an independence for the University of Cinema and Theater.
Teachers opposed to the changes recently held a kind of warning strike to score.
On Sunday, a demonstration train will run from Heroes’ Square in Budapest to the university and participants will be asked to dress up and bring accessories.
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