Glasnik Etnografskog Instituta SANU
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The Bulletin of the Institute of Ethnography SAS (I-VII)/ SASA (VIII/) is a scientific periodical of international significance which publishes papers in ethnology/anthropology. From its inception in 1952, the Bulletin publishes the results of scientific research projects of scientists and associates of the Institute and other affiliated institutions in the country and abroad. In addition, discussions and articles, supplements, field data, retrospectives, chronicles, reviews, translations, notes, bibliographies, obituaries, memories, critiques and similar are published as well. The Bulletin was founded as a means to publish the results of research of settlements and origins of populations, folk life, customs and folk proverbs. However, the concept of the Bulletin, like that of any other contemporary scientific journal, changed over time to accommodate the social, cultural and political processes and research trends in the social sciences and humanities.
The Bulletin (GEI) is referenced in the electronic bases: DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals), Ulrich's Periodicals Directory and SCIndex (Serbian Citation Index). All articles are digitally available in a form typographically true to the original (in .pdf format). The Bulletin is also available in the same form on the website of the Institute of Ethnography SASA.
The Bulletin (GEI SANU) can also be found and read at CEEOL (Central and Eastern European Online Library): http://www.ceeol.com
Pages
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- Towards an anthropology of care
- This paper discusses different aspects of anthropological research on breastfeeding, corporeality and ethics of care. The main focus is on the problem of relating care studies to the breastfeeding phenomenon and the conceptualisation of woman’s body, sexuality and motherhood. The paper suggests the need for a critical approach to the problems of caregiver domination and care receiver vulnerability in the “chain-of-care”, as well as the need for an anthropological contextualisation of relationships between care professionals’ and women’s experience.
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- Traces of social life in Bećarci from Drežnica
- Firstly, the identification of folk dances and pair dances of Serbian population on the border between Gorski kotar, Lika, and the Croatian Littoral has been performed. As it turned out, in the period between the two world wars and some fifteen years later this population knew 15 folk dances and 7 pair dances, among which was bećarac. Between 1989 and 2015, 29 bećarac dances were discovered in Drežnica, Bajmok, and Subotica, where many people from Drežnica settled after World War II. Secondly, the information on songs recordings and the names of song tellers, singers and dancers are given here. In addition, certain characteristics of the manner of singing and dancing are indicated here on the descriptive, verbal level, as well as the social oblivion which prevailed upon bećarac in both old and new surroundings and the attempt of its renewal. As it turns out, these songs tell about the physical appearance and habits of a bećar and a bećaruša, their social life (country gatherings, families, taverns), possible tensions and animosities between certain people and poverty of their families. All this is often presented in a cheerful and humorous manner. In this work, primarily because, in a way, ojkan and bećarac function as a system of adjoint dishes, a belief is stated that a systematization of social motifs on which ojkan from Drežnica is based upon could put a new light on the knowledge about bećarac and the social poetics which lies in its foundations.
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- Tradition and/or saint tradition in the current liturgical chanting of the Serbian church
- In the 90s in the liturgical life of the Serbian Church the so-called Byzantine chant was introduced, which has caused no small earthquakes among Serbian clerics and believers. This phenomenon was a part of the general Orthodox renewal movement, both in terms of worship and in theological thoughts, and in ecclesiastical artistic expression. New - Byzantine or Greek melos instituted unjustified ethnofiletistic emotions that are often the main criterion in assessing which melodies can follow worship in the Serbian church. On one side were the defenders of traditional national Serbian chant. On the other side were the chantors who, in accordance with the Church Slavonic text template, have adapted the melodies according to Bulgarian, but also the Greek neum records. The paper gives an overview of the main trends in polemics pro et contra mentioned chanting variants. The starting point is liturgical axioms in order to critically review the non-church, specifically emotional and ethnofiletistic criteria that in assessing which chanting variants are suitable for "Serbian" worship guided by advocates of folk/national religion, national church, and therefore national church singing.
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- Traditional competitive children's’ games as an instrument of socialization in Tovariševo
- Children’s games are one of the key features of childhood. The games help children to develop in physical and mental sense (perception, language, physical development), to express emotions and to fulfill certain important social motives such as needs for socialization, achievements, aggression, love and confirmation. At the same time, the games stand as an important instrument of socialization. A number of the traditional children’s games were never a subject of formal educational program, instead they represent a spontaneous expression in socialization of children. Based on a research in Tovariševo, this paper explores means of socialization among children using competitive games as an example. These games transmit explicit and implicit messages and values of the society to the children and they also help to form and model a child’s personality. In doing so, the games also help to maintain and preserve certain forms and values of the traditional society, which are being implanted from an early age into every individual from the community.
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- Traditional costume as a migration phenomenon on the part of the Adriatic coast in the 17th and 18th century
- Migrations from Herzegovina and Montenegro to the Herceg Novi region, during the period from the end of the 17th and beginning of the 18th centuries, were the reasons for investigation (thanks to the preserved archive material) of female "traditional costumes" involved in these migrations. Clothing retained the influence of Balkan, Slav, Oriental and Mediterranean cultures. The function of clothing (for work and ceremonial occasions) was studied, as well as changes within the generation, regardless of whether the individual items were in constant use or only used on one occasion.
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- Traditional culture of Slovakian minorities in Central and Southeastern Europe
- Throughout Europe and within various historical and socio-economic conditions, Slovaks have formed many enclaves and diasporas. In order to investigate common cultural and ethnic characteristics and/or differences between Slovaks in Slovakia and the various diasporas that they formed in relationship with majorities of their host countries, we suggest the usage of the cartographic method. Namely, during the 1997-1999 the Institute of Ethnology of the Slovakian Academy of Science used the cartographic method to analyze various complex questions relating to the traditional culture and ethnic history of many Slovakian minorities in the countries of Central Europe: in Poland, Ukraine, Romania and Hungary. The project was named Traditional Culture of Slovakian Minorities in Central Europe - the application of ethno-cartographic method in research and comparison of cultural manifestation. The project yield positive results and in 2000-2002 proceeded with yet another scientific project: Traditional Culture of Slovakian Minorities in Southeastern Europe - the application of the cartographic method in research and comparison of cultural manifestations once more, the data were obtained on the traditional folk culture of the Slovakian enclaves in Vojvodina and Croatia. The cartographic method used in both projects enabled researchers to document relevant data in a relatively short period of time. A solid foundation was created for a scientific synthesis of selected topics that deal with the traditional culture of Slovakian minorities in Central and Southeastern Europe, and its comparisons with the parent country culture. The cartographic method is widely used in Slovakia, in some 250 sites. Further, the scientific project of the Institute of Ethnology of the Slovakian Academy of Science named Traditional Culture of Slovakian Minorities in Central and Southern Europe as an integral part of their cultural inheritance (In between cultural stability and acculturation) that started in 2003, should document various mutual influences between the Slovakian minorities and socio-cultural systems of their host populations. That is, the project should establish a degree of the Slovakian minorities' assimilation or cultural stability in a given region.
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- Traditional perception of Greeks in Serbian oral tradition
- Based on material on Greeks from Vuk’s corpus of epic poems, we discuss the construction of ethnic stereotype of Greeks in Serbian language. However, the limitation of the paper’s possible conclusion lies in the nature of the corpus: Vuk had deliberately chosen one material over another, therefore, the corpus relating to Greeks cannot be considered as representative of the whole Serbian folk poems. Therefore, the discussion is limited to certain elements of the stereotype. Nevertheless, these Serbian epic folk poems contain many layers: historical, geographical, sociological, mythological and so on, with a strong foundation in traditional culture; thus, they provide an insight into geo-political situation of the time period, viewpoints, perspectives and experiences of other ethnic groups that Serbs have been into contact with. In particular, the relationship toward Greeks was marked with pronounced patriarchal attitude concerning others: we-others, ours-foreign, good-bad. In this sense, Greeks are portrayed as foreign, and as such, as a potential source of danger. On the other hand, Greeks are Christian Orthodox, which associates them with the category ours. In socio-economic sense, they were traders and wealthy, respected gentlemen. In epical-heroic profile, they were not considered as great heroes, but as "lousy army", and frequently, as unfaithful.
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- Transfer and counter-transfer in ethnographic research
- A researcher and his/hers informants stand as the key players in a fieldwork discourse, thus their interaction is a key problem of fieldwork performed by ethnologists and anthropologists. This paper aims to shed light on the roles of a researcher and informants and their mutually sustainable relationship formed in a research process. This fieldwork based relationship is very sensitive, burdened by many problems related to transfer and counter-transfer set about for a researcher to analyze and keep under control at all times. The notion of transfer was introduced into psychotherapy by Freud, but it is applicable as well onto all other human interactions. During the course of a fieldwork, informants can transfer a variety of feelings, thoughts and fantasies upon a researcher, who may or may not resemble some special persons from the informants' respective lives hence influencing the informants' behavior accordingly. A positive transfer is beneficial, as it tends to 'open up' the informant, while the negative one manifests in the informant's resistance toward cooperation, hiding of important information and so on. On the other hand, the actual appearance of an informant, his/hers behavior and accounts could also trigger various emotional, often subconscious, counter-transfer reactions. In this sense, a counter-transfer is a transfer by a researcher toward his/hers informants. For example, informants could, in their accounts, by saying this or that stir a researcher's negative associations and thus provoke counter-transfers with negative connotations (avoidance of particular informant, cessation of conversation, disinterest in informants' subjects, lack of empathy etc). This is why a researcher has to keep under control his/hers potential counter-transfer expressions; uncontrolled manifestation could cause various problems and burden the research process furthermore.
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- Tristes Tropiques
- This paper discusses an application of new readings of classical anthropological texts, using as an example the Levi-Strauss' book Tristes Tropiques and the book's impact, reception and application in the local (Serbian) anthropological practice. The messages of the classical works even they are published half a century ago, could still be considered significant especially so for the local anthropological practice. Tristes Tropiques were published in 1960 in Serbo-Croatian language (published by Zora, Zagreb) only 5 years after the first edition in French and more than a decade before the book was translated completely into English. At the time, the book was not classified as ethnography/anthropology - it was published in the edition of 'foreign writers', hence, it was considered to be a literary work/fiction. It is possible that the categorization of the book was due to the fact that Tristes Tropiques was very different than the contemporary works at the time in the local (than Yugoslavian) ethnological/ethnographical production. The difference appears too profound so no parallel could be drawn or discover any common ground. Susan Sontag argues that Tristes Tropiques is one of the great books of the 20th century, and Gertz claim that in the whole body of anthropology, there is not a text so self-referential and liberating as Tristes Tropiques. However, the book was not so widely read in Serbia especially not so as an anthropological literature, therefore, many educational points remained until this day outside of the framework of the local ethnographic production. Even though the book was published in XX century, it deserves to be read today for many reasons. We should read the book not because it represents a great ethnographic account, or because the author is a creator of a new paradigm in anthropology, but because the book even today, shed a light on the same thing: it is possible, even necessary to get out from the closed circle of the known way of thinking and because the book inspires many dilemmas and questions that could provide new unexpected answers, to be told in totally novel ways.
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- Tsunami diaries
- Inspired by recent discussion on how Serbian media influenced allegedly indifferent reaction of the public to the aftermath of tsunami, this paper examines the role of electronic media in Serbia, television in particular, in regard to their function as a central communication channel for acquiring knowledge about world surroundings. With a premise of having cultural and discursive power, Dnevnik, the central news program of the Serbian public broadcaster, is taken as a paradigmatic media text for analysis in order to examine ways in which global affairs and phenomena are portrayed and structured in television representation of reality. It is suggested that it is fair to conclude that world affairs are marginalized within the representational frame of news broadcasts, and that the media discourse could be depicted as dominantly introverted when it comes to global flow of information and cultural meanings, which is significant regarding cultural perception of world realities among Serbian audiences.
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- Turbo-folk and ethnicity in the mirror of the perception of the youtube users
- Popular music played in the second half of the 20th century on the territory of former Yugoslavia became known as the newly composed music. During the 1990s wars, music genre known as turbo folk was especially popular in Serbia. Research has shown that this music contains Oriental, most of all Ottoman, influences. Even though it is very popular, this kind of music has been subjected to severe criticism, which may be divided into two main groups. According to some, turbo-folk has been criticized because it was associated with war, nationalism and crime. In the second group are those who are nationalistically terrified of foreign influences in the music, feeling that this music leads to the "tehranization" of Serbia. In addition, critics think that it is kitsch, which favors immorality. The focus of this research is on the perception of turbo folk by You Tube users. The material from this Internet page for video exchange is available in the whole world. Many users from the territory of Former Yugoslavia leave their often nationalistic and political comments about songs. This work deals with the way listeners view their own connection with Ottoman past. What they experience as Turkish and as their own in those songs and what the value system is like. Apart from this, social influence of Internet culture is viewed, in this case on You Tube example. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. 177027: Multiethnicity, Multiculturalism, migrations - contemporary process]
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- Twenty years later
- The aim of this work is an analysis of the media narratives about the never ended football match between Dynamo Zagreb and Red Star Belgrade on May 13 1990. The article focuses on the media coverage twenty years after the incident in the context of the game's acquired mythic status, symbolically marking the beginning of the war in former Yugoslavia. The object of the analysis are Serbian and Croatian media with the aim of revealing the strategies of representing this event in the period of the normalization of the relations in the region. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. 177026: Cultural Heritage and Identity]