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Distinguishing ‘self’ and ‘other’: Anthropology and national identity in former Yugoslavia
Author(s) -
Boškovic AleksandaR
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
anthropology today
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.419
H-Index - 24
eISSN - 1467-8322
pISSN - 0268-540X
DOI - 10.1111/j.0268-540x.2005.00339.x
Subject(s) - montenegro , anthropology , social anthropology , library science , history , sociology , ethnology , computer science
‘The Balkans’ acquired a particular allure for anthropologists and social scientists as the wars and destruction raged in Yugoslavia during the 1990s. The question of location is central here: what and where is ‘the Balkans’, who decides, and on what basis? Just as with other cases of geographic and social constructions, the answers to these questions are far from clear. For example, maps issued in different countries vary in whether they include the Republic of Slovenia as part of ‘the Balkans’. In the US or France, for example, Slovenia is shown as part of the Balkans, but not in the UK or Germany. The Croatians’ view on this issue is also ambivalent (Rihtman-Auguštin 1998b, 1999). For the purpose of this discussion, all the countries that came into existence after the dissolution of Yugoslavia are considered part of ‘the Balkans’. As ethnologists/anthropologists have positioned themselves at the forefront of the ‘nation-building’ project in recent years, something needs to be said about the relationship of the Serbian, Croatian and Slovenian ethnological traditions to former Yugoslavia. In the early 20th century both the Slovenian and the Croatian elites opted to join the Serbs in what was to become Yugoslavia after 1918 – a move which enjoyed much popular support. Many Croatian, Serbian and Slovenian scholars take the view that ‘their nation’ has been unjustifiably victimized in recent years, and have taken it upon themselves, as the chosen interpreters of the ‘national culture’, to set the record straight. This paper examines evaluations of events between 1991 and 1999, highlighting the role of anthropologists (as well as social scientists in general) in the construction and consumption of such analyses. My choice of these three former Yugoslav republics is primarily based on the fact that they either had established ethnological traditions before the Second World War (Serbia, Croatia), or had seen intensive development of ethnology and ‘would-be anthropology’ in recent decades (Slovenia – cf. Godina 2002). Therefore, although excellent research has been, and continues to be conducted in other former regions of