If they hadn’t heard of it before, everybody
learned about the Balkans in the 1990s due
to a series of bloody conflicts in the area
formerly known as the Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia.
I was about to write “international conflicts,”
but back then, Yugoslavia was a single nation.
It first appeared as a state after WWI – initially
known as the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and
Slovenes and later as the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.
The kingdom, as well as its successor, socialist
Yugoslavia, sought to integrate all South
Slavic nations (except Bulgarians) into a
single Yugoslav nation (hence the name, jug/yug
standing for “south” in most Slavic languages),
but at some point (maybe even at the very
beginning), the process went in the totally
opposite direction.
Fast forward 73 years and Yugoslavia was no
more.
At the point of dissolution, the Socialist
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia broke up into
the following states: Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina
and Macedonia, while Serbia and Montenegro
stuck together for some more time and ultimately
broke up in 2004.
So, enter 3, exit 6, but that is not the end
of it.
Bosnia and Herzegovina, as such, is home to
3 constituent nations – Bosniaks, Serbs
and Croatians.
These three nations were also central to the
(attempted) creation of the Yugoslavian nation
– forming a tight ethno-linguistic cluster
which was supposed to act as the fulcrum of
the new state.
The language known as Serbo-Croatian or Croatian-Serbian
during the existence of Yugoslavia was also
formed on the basis of the central segment
of the South Slavic dialectal continuum.
The language was meant to integrate the nation
and promote bratstvo i jedinstvo (in English:
brotherhood and unity, a popular slogan and
a guiding principle of communist Yugoslavia’s
ethnic policies).
Macedonians and Slovenians were (and still
are) located on the peripheries of this dialectal
continuum, so we will leave them alone as
I will be focusing on language here.
In the Balkans, it is not quite right to say
that many extremes have aided the creation
of rifts between the nations of the former
Yugoslavia.
However, polarization has been a driving and
defining force throughout the history of this
region.
The public has been polarized by all sorts
of important and not so important issues used
to achieve various kinds of political goals.
What’s more, polarization was needed precisely
because we are all too similar.
In order to promote themselves and create
seemingly opposing national identities, our
post-Yugoslavian political “elites” needed
to emphasize the distinctive characters of
our nations – or to create them where they
had not existed already.
The most notable difference between the nations
currently making up the post-Yugoslavian region
is manifested in people’s affiliation with
three dominant faiths – Orthodox and Roman
Catholic Christianity, and Islam.
The first is practiced by the Serbs (and Montenegrins),
the second by Croats, while Bosniaks practice
Islam, a heritage of several centuries of
Ottoman rule.
Yet, in all three cases, religious affiliation
is seen more as a defining national trait
than a matter of faith.
This is, again, due to a lack of other fundamental,
inherent distinctions between us.
A prime example of polarization in the so-called
“Western Balkans” region can be seen in
language.
Or languages, as some would prefer.
From a purely linguistic point of view, the
languages spoken in the former Yugoslavia
include Serbo-Croatian and closely related,
but not entirely similar, Macedonian and Slovene.
That is what linguistics as an academic field
says.
For those not familiar with these languages
– the differences between the dialects of
Serbo-Croatian can be compared to those between
the dialects of English, e.g. British, American
or Australian English.
Some minor differences in grammar and spelling,
some variations in vocabulary, but nothing
drastic.
For instance, the difference between certain
local dialects within the Serbian language
is far greater than the difference between
Serbian and any other variety of Serbo-Croatian.
On the political level, however, the situation
looks a bit different.
After the dissolution of Yugoslavia, “brotherhood
and unity” fell out of favor, and so did
the name of the language as a vital part of
the concept.
Croatians decided to revert to calling their
“half” of the language Croatian, Serbs
logically stuck with Serbian, which left Bosniaks
in an uncomfortable position, so they quickly
came up with Bosnian.
Linguistically speaking, all these are standardized
varieties of a single dialect, and as such,
they are entirely mutually intelligible.
So what’s the big deal, you might ask?
Well, this is where it gets interesting.
In the vicious political arena of post-Yugoslavia,
language has been used as a handy tool for
solidifying the national identities based
upon the opposing concepts of “Us” vs.
“Them.”
Language as a means of polarization is particularly
convenient because you cannot change a nation’s
culture or mentality overnight, and neither
can you teach a nation to speak a whole new
language by issuing a decree.
However, what you can do is change the name
of a language and declare it to be “totally
different” than the one you want to distance
yourself from.
And that can yield truly absurd results.
For instance, although Bosniaks, Croats and
Serbs understand each other perfectly well,
regardless of how they prefer to call their
languages, that did not stop a certain Bosniak
politician in Serbia from demanding a Serbian-Bosnian
interpreter in a TV debate with a fellow Serb
politician.
The “trend” got an interesting twist when
a bunch of quick-thinking folks in Sanjak
or Raška – a region in Serbia inhabited
by a Bosniak minority – realized they could
use language to delay unwelcome legal proceedings
by demanding that all paperwork be “translated”
from Serbian into Bosnian.
Or this – some Serbs, for instance, are
likely to avoid using certain words or phrases
just because they feel “too Croatian”;
while the Croatian language, on the other
hand, has borrowed considerably from other
Slavic languages (in this case, the more unrelated,
the better) in order to appear more distinct
from Serbian.
However, when Croatian lawmakers decided to
force Croatian TV stations to translate all
Serbian movies, the decision (and especially
its outcome) was ridiculed by all except the
most hard-core nationalists.
The reason is simple – the end result was
awkward and superfluous, only distracting
the viewer and ruining the films’ artistic
value and original flavor.
Of course, the linguistic Balkanization does
not end there.
Today, half of Montenegrins consider themselves
Montenegrin by ethnicity, the other half consider
themselves part of the Serbian nation, regarding
the name Montenegrin as merely a geographical
determinant.
To add to the confusion, part of those that
see themselves as ethic Montenegrins claim
Serbian as their native tongue, while only
a minority has declared Montenegrin to be
their native language.
Which is not surprising, given that the language
was “discovered” less than 10 years ago.
Before that, everyone just spoke Serbian.
But now, thanks to this cultural advance,
it is not uncommon to have a Serbian speaking
Serb, a Serbian speaking Montenegrin and a
Montenegrin speaking Montenegrin within a
single family, depending on each’s political
preference!
I hope I haven’t confused you beyond all
hope because there is more to come.
Serbian is one of the few languages in the
world that uses two types of script – Latin
and Cyrillic.
This feature is a remnant of the aforementioned
Serbo-Croatian and attempted to achieve inter-ethnic
equality, because the Orthodox part of Yugoslavia
historically used Cyrillic, while the Catholic
and Muslim part used Latin.
Having been deprived of its only function,
this concept has turned into another source
of polarization, this time within the Serbian
nation.
One portion of the population prefers Cyrillic,
considering Latin script “Croatian” (and
thus unwelcome), while the rest prefer Latin,
considering it more “cosmopolitan, modern,
closer to the world,” contrary to Cyrillic,
which is held to be “obsolete, nationalistic”
and so on.
Do we need both?
Probably not, but we do need to have a bone
to pick.
Polarization does not only occur on the national
level – most of the people in the ex-Yugoslavian
region will either tell you that “Yugoslavia
was the best country in the whole world, we
never lived better” or “Good riddance,
it was a bloody dungeon” – irrespective
of what country they currently live in.
One will rarely hear a less emotional, middle
ground point of view.
You won’t meet many people who say “Yugoslavia
or no Yugoslavia, why can’t we just act
like normal people and realize that’s in
our best interest?”
It’s just not us, I guess.
Being so hopelessly similar, we have no other
option than to constantly accentuate the tiniest
of differences and fabricate new ones in order
to solidify our self-perception of “Us”
vs. “Them.”
Or at least, that is what our leaders keep
telling us.
But hey, divide et impera is not something
I came up with while writing this, it’s
been around a lot longer than that and as
it turns out – it still works!
Interestingly, though, once people remove
themselves from the sources of polarization
– which often happens when you move to another
country in search of a better life (which
a lot of us do) – you quickly realize we
are not that different after all.
Yugos that go abroad for work often stick
to their (former) neighbors.
Simply, they speak the same language, they
largely share the same culture and mentality,
and being alone in a foreign country makes
you see what being different really means.
And to the unbelievers, I will only say this
– if we really spoke different languages,
I am sure we would quarrel a lot less.
