Lit – In – Soc: Literature - Industry - Society between Colonialism and Globalisation: The Role of Literature and the Corporate Press in the Global Activities of the Baťa Concern (Marie Skłodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Project)

 

Since April 2025, Barbora Svobodová’s postdoctoral project has been conducted under the supervision of Professor Petra James and within the MODERNITAS research centre, as part of a two-year Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions fellowship (Horizon Europe), funded by the European Commission.

 

The Lit – In – Soc project examines the role of literature, corporate media, and cultural production in the global expansion of the Czechoslovak industrial concern Baťa. Founded in Zlín, Baťa became one of the most influential industrial enterprises of the 20th century, establishing company towns across several continents—including in Europe (France, Germany, Great Britain, Poland, Switzerland, former Yugoslavia), Asia (India), and the Americas (Brazil and Canada). Alongside its business activities, Baťa promoted a distinct ideological model grounded in work, discipline, and modernity. The company’s cultural policy aimed to shape cultural narratives, construct the identity of the “new industrial man,” and export this model as part of its international expansion.

Through its newspapers, literary awards, travelogues, pedagogical publications, and works of fiction, Baťa employed literature and corporate media not only to strengthen internal cohesion and education, but also as instruments of soft power. These cultural practices supported a comprehensive business model that merged entrepreneurial values with utopian social ideals.

Drawing on an interdisciplinary methodology that brings together literary history, the sociology of literature, cultural studies, and globalization studies, the project analyses Baťa’s cultural strategies in both domestic and international contexts—including the activities of its exile community after 1948. By focusing on a case situated at the intersection of Eastern and Western ideologies, the project aims to expand our understanding of how industry, literature, and global modernity intersect beyond dominant frameworks of empires and nation-states.

 

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 101211819.