Figures of Unity
Rhetoric and Reality of South Slavic Integration
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
Southern Slavism strove for a community of all Balkan Slavs. Its currents pursued different political and cultural goals, but resembled one another in their rhetoric of unity. In common festivals, rituals, and construction projects, the idea of unity crystallised in concepts such as that of the “south” or the initially positively connoted “Balkans”. In the course of the century, these forms of unity sparked enthusiasm, irony, alienation, rejection, and a new cautious interest. The political and cultural history of Slavic Southeastern Europe is reflected in the change of significance and function of unifying concepts and rituals.
(Osteuropa 12/2009, pp. 237–250)