Serbian Ethnology Research Articles

Pseudo-Marxism and Proto-Functionalism in Serbian Ethnology: Kulišić versus Filipović

This paper discusses an episode in the history of Serbian ethnology, which I take to be indicative of the conditions in domestic disciplinary production in the first decade following WWII. The debate on functionalism between the then-leading representa­tive of «vulgar materialism» (a form of pseudo-Marxism), Špiro Kulišić, and Milenko Filipović, who advocated an innovative social and functional perspective in ethnology (as a form of proto-functionalism), is viewed as a critical example that reveals the condition of academic ethnology at the time. Its characteristics were: the rule of in­tellectual inertia and ideological exclusivity; absence of constructive public discus­sions, debates and critical consideration of the subject, methods and aims of ethnol­ogy in the period of socialist transition; arrest of theoretical and methodological thought, exemplified by collector's empiricism and designed, schematic application of the Soviet model of «ideologically correct study». Proto-functionalism occurred in this setting as a rival strategy. Aware of the stagnation of Serbian ethnology and the need to innovate it, as well as of the complexity of the social and cultural milieu of the time, Filipović - in a theoretically modest and perhaps premature way - offered an alternative to the dogmatic views according to which ethnology was a study of rural surroundings and survivals; to the schematic application of methods and abstract concepts of evolutionism; and to the pretentious discourse of vulgar materialism, with its ideological and propaganda-serving functions.

Mihailo Lalić and Serbian Ethnology: Ethnography and Mimesis of Patriarchal Society in Montenegrin Highlands

My starting point is the yet unexplored supposition that Lalić’s realistic writing about the reality contains also a real ethnological and anthropological reference, first of all comments on the Serbian ethnology of the first half of the 20th century, its traditional paradigm, and strategy of ethnographic writing. My second supposition is that the deeper structure of Lalić’s historical novels is “inscribed” by the genre of ethnography which, together with other text types and stylistic means, contributes to the virtuoso construction of great narratives about the Montenegrin life world in historical perspective. Finally, an analysis of Lalić’s discourse reveals that despite the Marxist inspired criticism of ethnology as part of the Serbian national science, the discipline was an inevitable point of reference in the narrative construction of Montenegrin identity.

Urban research in Serbian ethnology and anthropology – from “the view from afar“ to a “subdiscipline”

This paper discusses urban research in Serbian ethnology (later on also anthropology). The era from the formal institutionalization of ethnology at the turn of the twentieth century until present day is segmented into five consecutive periods: the period before 1945, years between the end of World War II and the 1970s, from the seventies until the dissolution of Yugoslavia, the 1990s and the early 2000s, and the most recent contemporary period. This approximate timeline is made having in mind the state of urban research in Serbian ethnology and anthropology in the last more than hundred years, and prevalent periodizations of the overall disciplinary history; the paper gives a chronological discussion of dominant tracks and themes of ethnological/anthropological research of the cities.

The Conceptual Foundations of Vojin Matić's Paleopsychology in the Context of Serbian Ethnology

Vojin Matić was a leading figure in Serbian post-war psychoanalysis, particularly in the 1950s and 1960s. Paleopsychology, looked upon extremely favorably, even in a revolutionary way, by the Serbian psychoanalysts of the time, was the last and indisputably most problematic part of his oeuvre. The absence of necessary anthropological methodology, the uncritical adoption of discredited and rejected concepts (such as matriarchy), the promotion of 19th-century unilineal evolutionism viewing prehistory as the childhood of mankind – these are just some of the problems of Matić's paleopsychological oeuvre. Nevertheless, this did not prevent him from leaving an indelible imprint on the thinking of numerous generations which would go on to position Serbian psychoanalysis on the international stage. Although untenable by contemporary anthropological standards, Matić's paleopsychology is interwoven with the Serbian psychoanalysis of the 1970s and 1980s, exerting a decisive influence on its application in the humanities, from Vladeta Jerotić's psychoanalytical culturology to Zoran Gluščević's literary criticism. Matić, in turn, actively adopted some outdated positions from the Serbian ethnology of the time. By providing this broader theoretical, historical and academic context, the paper seeks to shed light not only on the occurrence of this scientifically questionable theory, but also on its (surprisingy "uncritical") acceptance outside the anthropological community. The paper therefore presents, in turn: 1) the tenets of Matić's paleopsychology, with emphasis on the features it shared with contemporary anthropology; 2) the biographical and disciplinary/historical background of paleopsycholgy in the works of world psychoanalysts and anthropologists, and in the practices of Serbian ethnology; it is pointed out that Matić's paleopsychology merely provided a psychoanalytic perspective to conventional Serbian ethnology; 3) a reading of Matić's paleopsychological system as a "strong" paranoid theory, that is to say, a theory which, through specific mechanisms os associativity and anticipation, absorbs every ethnographic, anthropological and archaeological fact, thus metastasizing into a self-contained and hermetic system (something that Matić himself noted as a possible structure of his own thinking).

Index “Corona”: Symbolic Employment of COVID-19 in the Public Discourse in Serbia

In this paper we analyze the different ways in which COVID-19 is used as a carrier of cultural communication, whereupon it appears as a signifier of other socio-cultural phenomena and as a conveyer of messages of such communication. Accordingly, this paper will not observe health plan of COVID-19, nor the accompanying sociological phenomena of the epidemic in the strict sense of the word, but will focus instead on the cultural dimension of the infection. As a cultural phenomenon, the process of the planetary spread of COVID-19 infection – and hence the virus itself – can be viewed as an ambiguous symbol through which the collective experience of reality is constructed and communicated, perceived and interpreted. By relying on the decades-long tradition of Serbian ethnology and anthropology in the modified application of structural-semantic analysis, we define the use of COVID-19 as a symbolic means of cultural communication, here seen as indexical. This means that the said communication is organized on the principle that “A indicates B”, where the signifying A refers to the metaphorical and metonymic use of the disease, and B refers to various social phenomena related to it. As a metonymy, the considered phenomenon can be seen in the light of the classical binary division of purity and danger, whereupon the virus, in the cultural sense, divides the whole social reality into pure (still unpolluted) and impure aspects, one corresponding to the “normal” condition of things, and the other indicating a sense of explicit danger – not only from infection, but from the collapse of the social system and the disintegration of public health and community as well. As a metaphor, we observe the virus in relation to the official political instrumentalization of the discourse of warfare, which – depending on who employs it, and why – generates different notions on the “invisible enemy”, war victims (deceased as a consequence of infection) and “(super) heroes” (primarily, health workers, but also state officials and other public figures). COVID-19 is, however, peculiar because it can also play the role of an inverse sign, by which common cultural concepts and representations are perverted, destabilizing the shared sense of “real” and “normal”.

Srebrica Knezevic: Academic and pedagogical framework in ethnology and anthropology

This paper reviews the life and work of Srebrica Knežević (1930-2012) in order to present her career, achievements and fields of study that she contributed to. Special attention will be paid to the importance of her role in pioneer research of folk medicine, nutrition and world ethnology, as well as comprehension of the significance of interdisciplinary approach in Serbian ethnology. Also, this paper will depict Srebrica Knežević as a researcher loyal to her ethnographic field, therefore indicating the compromises she had to make for her very frequent trips and researches. Finally, I will speak of Srebrica Knežević as a lecturer and a professor who adjusted her impressions for the classroom setting and her students, during four decades of work at the Department of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade. As a gifted lecturer who implemented innovations in the classroom, she is remembered as a creative, passionate and dedicated professor, who brought distant topics and ethnographic fields to life. The life and work of Srebrica Knežević are presented and analyzed based on the relevant literature and conversations with her colleagues, students, friends and family.

Olivera Mladenovic and folk dances in the context of Serbian ethnology

Olivera Mladenovic was born in 1914 in Skopje (Macedonia), but her entire professional and private life was connected to Belgrade and Serbia. Olivera Mladenovic received her BA both in Yugoslav Literature and Serbian Language with the Old Church Slavonic Language, and in Ethnological Studies, while also receiving a PhD in the latter in 1965, because she considered that ethnology was important for further study of folk dances. The main subject of research by this scientist was folk dances, as she terminologically defined the subject of her study. Olivera considered folk dances from a scientific point of view, but she also practically contributed to the preservation and promotion of this phenomenon, organizing various seminars, holding lectures, participating in folklore festivals and, finally, establishing National Folk Dance and Song Ensemble of Serbia Kolo. In this paper, using primarily archival sources and then accessible literature, I will show how Olivera Mladenovic contributed to Serbian ethnology as a scientific discipline by researching folk dances. [Project of the Serbian Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development, Grant no. 177027: Multietnicitet, multikulturalnost, migracije -savremeni procesi]

Black and white magic as cultural heritage: Ideas about Vlach magic among young people in Bor

Serbian ethnology and anthropology is missing papers on folk belief and magic practices on black and white magic. This paper problematizes research on Vlach magic as an authentic and archaic culture of the ethnic Vlachs in North-Eastern Serbia. The first part of the paper deals with theoretical concepts of magic, while the second presents the results of research on the relationship between young people in Bor towards Vlach magic, as part of traditional folk religion and archaic cultural heritage which is still relevant today.

Reception of Jovan Cvijic in Slovenian ethnology

The paper discusses the reception of the work of Jovan Cvijić in Slovenian ethnology. Cvijić is considered to be one of the founding fathers of Serbian ethnology, due in large part to his anthropogeographical orientation that strongly marked ethnological research in Serbia until the second half of the 20th century. In Slovenian ethnology, the so-called anthropogeographical school is virtually unknown; however, some of its tenets can be recognized or were actively applied in research of cultural areas, carried out by geographers and ethnographers before and after the Second World War when anthropogeography was considered to be a branch of geography and a discipline akin to ethnography/ethnology. The author aims to discuss when, for whom and in what way was Jovan Cvijić direct or indirect reference within the horizon of Slovenian ethnology. His reception is marked by acknowledging the powerful influence of his political views and engagement on his scholarship.

The anthropology of music: Contemporary theoretical perspectives

The anthropological study of music focuses on meanings which music hah and produces in a specific sociocultural context. Preferences toward a certain genre of music are tightly linked to the preference of certain cultural values, so music represents an important factor of identification in everyday life. In Serbian ethnology and anthropology music was long viewed as part of Serbian traditional culture, so the interests of researchers focused on “traditional music”. In the 1980’s first papers analyzing music which went outside the traditional frameworks appeared (new folk music – turbofolk), and this tendency has increased in the last ten years.

New rituals and new Serbian anthropology – The process of mutual constituting

The intensive shift toward studying new rituals in the mid-80 is one of the key points of modernization and anthropologization of Serbian ethnology. The key initiator of this shift was the Ethnological society of Serbia, the scene of events were the yearly councils of the Ethnological society, and Papers in Ethnology, the society’s journal, published the first papers about new rituals. In the ambience of ethnology back then, wherein the foremost interests were concerned with recording memories of rural life in the 19th century, the innovative character of researching the send-off of retiring workers, entrance of children into the pioneer organization, send off of men to obligatory military service, the behavior in coffee shops or at the promenade, was more than obvious. From today’s perspective, thirty years later, the significance of these events for the constituting of the new Serbian anthropology is reviewed.

Dušan Bandić – context, opus, significance

The scientific opus of Dušan Bandić is viewed through the context and time frame in which he started researching folk religion in order to, through the analysis of his most important texts, arrive at the conclusion about the importance of his opus for the modernization of Serbian anthropology. This is just one segment, although the most important one, of the evaluation of the significance of an opus for the history of Serbian anthropology. Other aspects of action, which refer to institutional positioning and activity as well as one’s social and political life and ultimately the consequences such actions had are significant for the history of science, but are not encompassed by this paper. The paper deals with the description of the context and state of research into folk religion at the beginning of Bandić’s career and the general knowledge about global anthropological trends in Serbian ethnology at the time. Afterwards the focus is shifted to the contents of his work through viewing the larger ideas and methodological systems present in Bandić’s work – evolutionism, functionalism and structuralism, in order to, ultimately, come to a conclusion about the development of methods which Bandić applied, as well as the place which his opus occupied in a crucial time for Serbian ethnology.

Jovan Cvijic and the beginnings of establishing ethnology as a discipline in Serbia

The role of Jovan Cvijić, especially his anthropogeographical school in the early stages of the development of ethnology in Serbia was undeniably significant. Today its influence is largely obsolete, which is not surprising given the temporal distance from the time the discipline was founded, in the late nineteenth and early twenties centuries. In spite of that, in some recent critical reviews, Cvijić’s work and its importance for the development and shaping of ethnology as a discipline in Serbia are contested as highly controversial. In this paper the author tries to discern why has this occurred, and whether it would still be justified, from today’s perspective, to consider Jovan Cvijić as one of the founding fathers of Serbian ethnology.

The Jankovic sisters’ legacy in the National library of Serbia

Sisters Ljubica (1894-1974) and Danica (1868-1960) Jankovic were very prominent figures in the cultural and scholarly life of Belgrade, Serbia (Yugoslavia in their time). Their work, primarily ethno-coreological, was considered to be very important by experts worldwide. After the death of Ljubica (the last member of this family) in 1976 and until the present, the sisters? legacy (manuscripts, letters, fieldwork data etc.) is kept in the National library of Serbia. In addition to the materials left by the sisters, the legacy also contains manuscripts by other family members, some of whom were also prominent scholars, including their uncle, Prof. Tihomir R. Djordjevic (1868-1944), one of the founding fathers of Serbian ethnology. Unfortunately, the legacy is still not open to the public. This year, however, work on classifying this important archival material has begun, and, once completed in 2016, it will become available to the public at large. This paper briefly describes the project, and the legacy itself.

New possibilities for the ethnogenetic study of the population of Serbia

The paper points to new possibilities of inquiry into the ethnogenesis of the population of Serbia, with an accent on the Serbian ethnos. Over the last years, within a global framework, genetic research of origin, genealogies, ethnogenetic and migrational processes have pointed to a wide array of new aspects, by pointing us towards previously unknown ways of viewing the past of different peoples and ethnic groups. The text presents an introductory overview of research that was begun, with basic pointers as to relevant conclusions. Based on our preliminary research and insights, it can be argued that Serbian ethnology gained a new, powerful weapon in the struggle to bring ethnogenetic and migrational processes to light - or rather - in the analysis of the notions about origins and the past (within the context of testing their veracity).

The Economic Viability of Ethnicity: Economic Behavior as an Expression of Ethnic Identity among Serbian Immigrants in the USA

The economic aspect of ethnicity represents a wide topic of research which still hasn’t been extensively studied in Serbian ethnology and anthropology. It encompasses numerous kinds of relationships between people who belong to the same ethnic group, as well as all kinds of economic discrimination or economic favorizing based on ethnic identity. In this paper I shall attempt to highlight some of the basic characteristics of this issue, and to point out the interconnectedness of economic behavior and ethnic identity, based on one case study. I shall also demonstrate some of the specifics of the socio-economic system within which the studied topic was considered (USA), as well as the complex and ambiguous influence that this system has had on ethnic identity through certain economic actions. The paper focuses on the economic aspect of ethnicity of the Serbian Diaspora in the US, and certain specific issues are considered through the example of the economic behavior of one Serbian immigrant from Romania.

Mile Nedeljković as a social, cultural and ethnic issues researcher

Mile Nedeljković published about a hundred titles in ethnology, literature, folklore studies and journalism, focusing especially on Šumadija, the traditional culture of the Serbian and other South-Slavic peoples, as well as peoples and their cultures worldwide. This contribution makes an attempt to look at his major ethnological works, which address social, cultural and ethnic issues. As it turns out, they deal with some of the most intricate, most sensitive and most important issues of national history and culture, such as Kosovo and Metohija as the cradle of Serbian spirituality, Islamization in the South-Slavic areas, Šumadija as the pivot of Serbia’s restored statehood, or the gloomy destiny of the Serbs the Frontiersmen and their expulsion from Croatia in the 1990s. As it also turns out, their author has a fundamental and diverse work, the ability to make sweeping syntheses and significant scholarly discoveries, the culture of chronicle keeping, and the simplicity and beauty of narrative expression, and, as such, he belongs to the very top of contemporary Serbian ethnology.

Modernism and Structuralism: Serbian Ethnology/Anthropology in the Last Twenty Five Years of the Twentieth Century

Modernisation of Serbian ethnology/anthropology in the second quarter of the twentieth century was marked by structuralism. More precisely, structural analysis that became a must of the analytical interpretation was based on the work of Claude Levi-Strauss, but also on those of the predecessors of structural analysis, like Van Gennep and Prop; British followers of structuralism like E. Leach and M. Douglas, as well as on the Russian semiotic school and Barth’s semiology. Taking aside predecessors of structural analysis, main sources of Serbian structural-semiotic revolution came from Levi-Strauss structural anthropology.
 When in the 1970s Serbian readers faced anthropological books coming from different intellectual backgrounds and representing major theoretical trends in anthropology, Serbian ethnology, firmly based on its hundred years old romantic roots, gave equally opportunities to all theoretical approaches that fought for the intellectual domination in the discipline. This paper tries to answer the question why structural analysis played a crucial part in the modernisation of Serbian ethnology/anthropology, while the ideas coming from functionalism, culture and personality school, or neo-evolutionism did not have the same revolutionary and deep impact.

Anthropology and/as an applied ethics

In the context of the upcoming reactivation of the Serbian Ethnology and Anthropology society and the normalization of the work of professional associations, as well as their occasional adoption of their ethic codes in Serbia, we are analyzing the ethic code of the biggest professional anthropological association in the world- American Anthropology Association (AAA). Starting from the assumption that ethic codes are not „pure“moral algorithms of the desirable/correct, but that they are enriched/burdened with „hidden“ theoretic and methodological assumptions, whether by their direct authors, or on the level of the silent knowledge of the disciplinary community, we are examining what can Serbian ethnological/anthropological community learn from the genesis, structure, function and criticism directed at the ethic code of AAA. We are also considering the thesis that the ethic codes of anthropologic associations are legitimizing narrative practices, not unlike those of magic, through which the discipline is attempting to transform itself from the status of fluid and generally socially unrecognized (and even obscure) occupation into a generally recognized, formally licensed and respectable profession. We suggest for anthropology in Serbia to construct its professional status by forming an alliance with applied ethics offering the services of customization of ethic codes to other professions, through cultural analysis of moral decision-making, as an alternative to legitimizing itself through a contradictory, ethics code burdened with hollow magic principles and theoretical and methodological issues.

Time with or without death: Researching death in Serbian ethnology during the second half of the 20th century

Topics of ethnological research, as well as scientific discourse in general often represent the mirror of social reality. This paper researches the ways in which dealing with death and current ethnological approaches in Serbian ethnology during the second half of the 20th century, reflect the Zeitgeist. The intensity and the quality of interests for this important anthropological theme varied during the researched period, wherefore it is possible to differentiate two types of works and authors: those who write about funeral rituals, and those who 'read' them. From 1980s until nowadays there are three subgroups of contributions to this theme that reflect critical moments of the contemporary Serbian history. The issues raised in this paper are the following: The way in which state/society regards death the way in which it structures death, the way in which it gives meaning to death, as well as the usage of death for political purpose and the constant effort of civilization to repress it into oblivion.