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US AND THEM
Edited by
Ivana Spasić
Predrag Cvetičanin
Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
C E C S S-E E
e Institute for Philosophy and Social eory
of the University of Belgrade
All rights reserved
Published in 2013.
Reviewers
Jessica R. Greenberg,
Department of Anthropology,
University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana
Mirko Petrić,
Department of Sociology,
University of Zadar
Slobodan Naumović,
Department of Ethnology and Anthropology,
University of Belgrade
Graphic design
Ivan Stojić
Printed in Serbia
by Sven, Niš
June 2013.
Prepared within the framework of the Regional Research Promotion Programme
in the Western Balkans (RRPP), which is run by the University of Fribourg
upon a mandate of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, SDC,
Federal Department of Foreign Aairs. e views expressed in the papers are
those of the authors and do not necessarily represent opinions of the SDC and
the University of Fribourg.
Contents
Editors’ Introduction .........................................5
EXCLUDING THE OTHER IN THE BALKANS:
FROM THE OTTOMAN TURK TO LGBTIQ ........................17
Aleksandar Pavlović
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition
and the Formation of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy ................ 19
Réka Krizmanics
Nation-Characterology of Dinko Tomašić ............................ 37
Irena Šentevska
“Anything but Turban-folk”: the ‘Oriental Controversy’
and Identity Makeovers in the Balkans ...............................51
Anja Tedeško
e Invisibility of LGBTIQ [People] between
Legislative and Social Aspects in BIH .................................71
THE GEOGRAPHY OF SYMBOLIC DIFFERENCES:
VILLAGE, TOWN, REGION ....................................85
Ana Ranitović
Why do they call it Raška when they mean Sandžak?
A Case Study of Regionalism in South-West Serbia .................... 87
Ana Aceska
“Us” and “em” in Post-War Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina ............. 105
Gábor Basch
Settlers, Natives, and Refugees: Classicatory Systems
and the Construction of Autochthony in Vojvodina ..................119
THE VAGARIES OF ETHNICITY, RELIGION AND LANGUAGE ......133
Tamara Pavasović-Trošt
e Complexity of Ethnic Stereotypes:
A Study of Ethnic Distance among Serbian Youth ..................... 135
Vladan Pavlović
Miloš Jovanović
“Language Nationalism” vs. “Language Cosmopolitanism”:
Divisions in the Attitudes towards the Relation between
Language and National Identity .................................... 165
Davor Marko
Power Constellation(s), Symbolic Divisions and Media:
Perception of Islam as a Personalized, “Minorized” and
Subordinated Part of Serbian Society ...............................179
IMAGINING POLITICAL COMMUNITY .........................197
Ana Omaljev
Constructing the Other/s: Discourses on Europe
and Identity in the ‘First’ and the ‘Other’ Serbia ......................199
Ivana Spasić
Tamara Petrović
Varieties of “ird Serbia” ........................................219
Zoran Stojiljković
Political Capital and Identities of Serbian Citizens ....................245
Notes on Authors ..........................................263
Editors’ Introduction
5
Editors’ introduction
is book issues from the project “Social and Cultural Capital in Serbia”, imple-
mented between 2010 and 2012 by the Centre for Empirical Cultural Studies of
South-East Europe. is project was carried out within the Regional Research
Promotion Programme in the Western Balkans (RRPP), run by the University of
Fribourg upon a mandate of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.
While in the rst year of the project our research was focused on the multi-
dimensional social structure in Serbia, the resources (or capitals) social groups
rely on, and strategies people pursue in their daily life, in the second year the
primary goal was to identify the basic symbolic divisions in the Serbian society
and discursive strategies used to construct, maintain, legitimize or contest these
divisions. Using content analysis and discourse analysis we analyzed texts in
three groups of media in Serbia: daily newspapers (the dailies Politika, Kurir
and Danas), magazines (Vreme and NIN), and (semi)professional journals
(Nova srpska politička misao and Peščanik) along with their websites, in the
seven-year period from 2006 to 2012. We looked at how in these dierent types
of media, aimed at dierent audiences, various kinds of symbolic divisions are
instantiated – distinctions on the basis of wealth, morality, political orientation,
gender and sexuality, ethnicity, religion, manners and taste, education, urbanity,
or degree of “Orientalism”. Our primary interest lay in how these cleavages
were constructed, represented and legitimized.1
Since our research interests are predominantly regional in scope, we were
interested in exchanging experiences with colleagues from other Western Balkan
societies. To this purpose, the conference “Us and em – Symbolic Divisions in
Western Balkan Societies” was held on 7 and 8 July 2012. e organizers were
the Centre for Empirical Cultural Studies of South-East Europe and the Institute
for Philosophy and Social eory of the University of Belgrade. Nineteen papers
were presented at the Conference, and a selection of these presentations make up
the core of this volume. In addition, in the late 2012 a call for papers was issued
which also brought us a number of interesting papers not previously presented at
the Conference. In selecting the contributions to this volume, we have sought to
encompass various theoretical approaches and a wide geographical distribution
of the phenomena under study, in order to present the multifarious symbolic
divisions, as well as certain sore spots, in the societies of the Western Balkans.
e study of symbolic divisions has a long tradition in the social sciences.
Among the founding fathers of sociology, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber
took keen interest in classication systems and symbolic boundaries these sys-
tems establish. While Durkheim focused on the relation of such boundaries to
communal identity and the moral order in society [Durkheim et Mauss 1903;
1 e results of these inquiries will be published in another volume which is forthcoming.
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
6
Durkheim 1995 (1912)], Weber was rather concerned with their inuence on
the emergence and reproduction of social inequality [Weber 1978 (1922)]. In
Saussure’s wake, structuralism [Lévi-Strauss 1963 (1958)] developed a power-
ful framework for identifying and interpreting fundamental cultural binaries.
Mary Douglas [1966] famously redened the notions of purity and pollution,
while Fredrik Barth [1969] saw the boundary between self and other, Us and
em, as the crucial element in the constitution of ethnicity. In sociology, the
problematique of symbolic divisions was revived by Pierre Bourdieu [1977, 1979,
1991, 1997] who with his conceptual innovations of symbolic capital, symbolic
power, and symbolic violence, as well as with his strongly culturalized class
theory, created a solid base for the sociological study of symbolism for decades
to come. Symbolic interactionism contributed the indispensable concept of
stigma [Goman: 1963] and a set of research tools for examining in detail how
symbolic dierentiation is worked out at the micro level of everyday life [e.g.
Becker: 1963]. Michèle Lamont, with her pioneering post-Bourdieuan Money,
Morals, and Maners [1992; see also Lamont and Fournier /eds/ 1992] launched
the “study of boundaries” as an explicit and specialized area of sociological
endeavor [Lamont and Molnár 2002; Pachucki, Pendergrass and Lamont 2007].
Since then, she has been working on an increasingly broad research program,
recently termed the “comparative sociology of valuation” [Lamont: 2012] or
the study of “cultural repertoires” [Lamont and évenot eds. 2000]. In close
proximity to Lamont’s position, a Paris-based group headed by Luc Boltanski
and Laurent évenot has been developing a pragmatic sociology of justication
[Boltanski et évenot: 1991]. In the US, the neo-Durkheimian “strong program
in cultural theory” of Jerey Alexander and his associates [Alexander 2003, 2006,
Alexander, Giesen and Mast /eds/ 2006] seeks to provide an alternative to Bour-
dieuan cultural analysis, assigning a much wider and more autonomous space
for cultural structures and the creation of meaning in studying social realms
such as inequality, politics, war, social change, or the social life of technology.
ese and other authors, in sociology, anthropology, social psychology, and
philosophy (such as Andrew Abbot, Paul DiMaggio, Norbert Elias, Richard
Jenkins, Charles Tilly, Eviatar Zerubavel, to name just a few), continue to study
symbolic boundaries as a basis for establishing class, gender, and racial inequality,
in constituting social groups, in distinguishing and hierarchizing cultural and
other practices, and in the shaping of collective and individual identities – from
national, ethnic, and religious to gender and sexual.
Many of these approaches have been put to practice in the papers collected
in this volume. In spite of all their variety in terms of ideas, concepts, methods,
and substantive issues addressed, the papers also exhibit some unexpected but
welcome similarities. To begin with, they are all interdisciplinary in character.
Whether they combine cultural history and literary theory, discourse analysis
Editors’ Introduction
7
and political philosophy, sociology and social psychology, or anthropology and
media studies, none of them remains conned within the limits of a single disci-
pline. is tells us something about the nature of symbolic divisions as a subject
matter for scholarly research. Second, although starting from widely diering
theoretical assumptions, all the papers assert some form of constructionism,
as against an essentialist understanding of identities and groups which is quite
common in Balkan studies. is is related to a third common point, which is
the questioning of established knowledge on the Balkans and undermining of
black-and-white renderings of social life in the region. Avoiding simplications
and easy generalizations, the contributions favor a carefully nuanced approach.
ey tend to point out the ambiguity and instability inherent in the production
of symbolic divisions, and never forget to look at both sunny and dark sides of
the phenomena under study. Just as positive potentials are sought in negative
examples so the unintended consequences of well-meaning and politically de-
sirable institutional change are highlighted. Similarly, against the grain of much
of writings on the Balkans, which still prefer to focus on nationalism and the
legacy of war, the contributions to this volume show convincingly that in these
societies, just like in any other, many dierent kinds of divisions and cleavages
are present. Some of them are benign, while some others are potentially no
less hazardous than the much more (in)famous inter-ethnic antagonisms. But
they all deserve serious study, because they shape the present moment and the
future of Western Balkan societies. Finally, all the contributions, so to speak,
take symbolism seriously – as world-creating, reality-constituting, rather than
being just an epiphenomenon of some deeper structures. Yet none of them claims
that the analysis of the symbolic exhausts the whole of social life: materiality, in
the form of income inequalities, power dierentials, and institutional structure
is not le out of the picture. Instead, issues of production and reproduction of
symbolic boundaries are consistently linked to questions of power, resistance,
strategy, and struggle over resources.
e papers are presented in four blocks, three to four papers each. e rst
group discusses the issue of “othering” in the Balkans at the most general level,
starting from the historical background up to the present day. Continuities and
discontinuities in the mechanisms of producing the “other” are in the focus here:
while some things have remained surprisingly similar over the centuries – like
tying the image of the Other to the image of the Turk – some others have surged
only recently as subjects of heated public debate, such as the status of LGBTIQ
fellow citizens as a kind of “internal other” in most Western Balkan societies.
In “Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition and the Formation of
‘the Turk’ as the Political Enemy” Aleksandar Pavlović traces the formation of
“the Turk” as the enemy in the Western Balkans around the middle of 19th cen-
tury. Bringing together Schmittian political philosophy and literary studies, he
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
8
focuses on the transformation of the Balkan oral tradition under the inuence
of national ideology and political leadership. Using a combination of textual
and contextual analysis, the author compares four versions of a Montenegrin
epic song and shows that the growing impact of the emergent central political
authority resulted in a shi in the way the enemy is depicted. From an empha-
sis on inter-tribal rivalries the hostility described in the song was increasingly
framed in religious and ethnic terms, as stemming from the very “Turkishness”
of the adversary. In other words, the clan or tribal enemy was transformed into
the national/political enemy. Having showed the shiing positions of self and
other in the subsequent versions of the “same” epic song, Pavlović concludes
that no specic politics is inherent to Serbian epic tradition. Rather, nationalism
was inserted in it during the process of publication and canonization in the rst
half of the 19thcentury. is leaves open the possibility of reading a dierent,
less aggressive and less exclusive politics into it as well.
Another piece that seeks to uncover some of the historical roots of symbolic
boundaries in the Balkans, Réka Krizmanics’ “Nation-Characterology of Dinko
Tomašić” looks at a scholarly discipline now almost forgotten, but widely popular
in the early decades of the 20th century. It was then that the Croatian ethnologist
Dinko Tomašić introduced the distinction between the “plowman of the plain”
and the “Dinaric warrior”, based on some ethnographic evidence but with strong
evaluative overtones. e distinction has proved very useful for various actors
in dierent Balkan nations for waging their own political and cultural battles
all the way to our times. e heyday of reviving Tomašić, along with his Serbian
counterpart Jovan Cvijić, was the period of escalating interethnic tensions in
the former Yugoslavia starting in the late 1980s. ese two early ethnologists
are usually seen as rivals and as legitimating two opposed national projects,
the Croatian and the Serbian one respectively. Krizmanics discusses in detail
the commonalities and dierences between the two approaches and points to
the ways these have been taken up by Tomašić’s and Cvijić’s newly-born heirs
in post-Yugoslav scholarship and politics.
Irena Šentevska in her “’Anything but Turban-folk’: the ‘Oriental Contro-
versy’ and Identity Makeovers in the Balkans”, discusses the debates over the
“Oriental motifs” in Balkan popular music. Focusing on Serbian and Bulgarian
cases, but also including examples from Turkey, Croatia, Romania and Albania,
the author points to a host of similar features these debates share across the
region. e longstanding controversy revolves around the fact that the music
“tainted” by Oriental inuences is widely appreciated by its numerous fans
from the ranks of ordinary people, while being deeply detested and despised
by intellectual elites, both nationalist and liberal. Even though music studies
have long held that “authenticity” in music is a spurious notion and functions
rather as an ideological construct, Šentevska shows how a tireless quest for the
Editors’ Introduction
9
“pure” national music has continuously characterized expert discourse on music
in the various Balkan societies. e seemingly aesthetic debates have actually
sprung from much deeper cultural understandings of “us” and “them”. For most
Balkan nations, “them” are in the rst place the Ottoman Turks who ruled the
region for centuries and le an indelible, but strongly resented, imprint on the
traditions and present-day cultural practices. In interpreting these processes,
the author uses Bakić Hayden’s concept of “nesting orientalisms” to delineate
complex grids of internal hierarchization of folk music and its fans within these
various national cultural settings.
Anja Tedeško asks a slightly dierent set of questions. Her paper “e In-
visibility of LGBTIQ [People] between Legislative and Social Aspects in BiH”
reminds us that ethnicity, political aliation and cultural ideology are not the
only areas where symbolic boundaries and struggles to (re)dene them arise.
Gender identity and sexual orientation are oen neglected lines of dierentiation,
especially in societies where the public agenda is dominated by other kinds of
problems, such as Bosnia-Herzegovina. e author examines the contradictory
eects of the legislation recently passed in BiH which was aimed at redressing
gender inequalities and ghting discrimination. Although they represent a step
forward in improving the status of women in a male-dominated society, such
laws in practice tend to essentialize gender identities according to the binary
heteronormative model. An even more serious problem is the gap between the
norm and the practice within the local sociocultural context. e legislation
is mostly imposed from the outside and motivated by a sort of Western “legal
imperialism” insensitive to the local needs and constraints. At the same time,
the everyday life of LGBTIQ people continues to be characterized by margin-
alization, violence, discrimination and inadequate legal protection.
In the second section, the three papers locate issues of symbolic divisions in
particular, real-life sites, looking at how broader symbolic distinctions are inect-
ed at the local level, how they are transformed by local histories and identities,
and how they are manipulated locally in ambiguous strategies that sometimes
contradict the grand narratives of nation and state at the macro level. In “Why
do they call it Raška when they mean Sandžak? A case study of regionalism in
south-west Serbia”, Ana Ranitović studies local reactions to regionalist policies
implemented by the state in the border region of south-west Serbia populated
by orthodox Serbs and Muslim Bosniaks. For historical, demographic and
cultural reasons, this region has been caught in a chronic identity crisis, since
no consensus has been reached regarding its history and even its name both
across and within ethnic groups. e re-regionalisation process, recommend-
ed by the EU and launched by the Serbian state authorities in 2009-2010 has
brought some positive results, but also generated heightened ethnic tensions
between the dierent communities. Weaving geography, history, law, politics
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
10
and culture together, Ranitović examines symbolic borders – the ones people
put up in order to separate themselves from each other, as well as the ones they
imagine bound the territory they live in and from which they draw their identity.
She bases her analysis on ethnographic material collected through eldwork in
Sjenica, Novi Pazar, Prijepolje, Nova Varoš and Belgrade. It is shown how a set
of measures supposedly motivated by purely economic and practical concerns
have quickly turned into a historicized, politicized, and emotionally charged
debate, reproducing the symbolic boundaries between dierent local groups.
On the basis of ethnographic eldwork, Ana Aceska in “’Us’ and ’em’ in
a Divided City: Symbolic Divisions among the City Dwellers in the Divided
City of Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina” resists the widespread assumption that in
ethnically divided cities there is no sense of togetherness and that the city as a
whole is not a locus for self-identication and joint responsibility on both sides
of the ethnic line. She argues instead that there is, or at least may be, a common
“us” that city dwellers of dierent ethnicities construct jointly. She looks at the
contents of a local monthly to document the narratives of this shared belonging
which is at once symbolic, emotional and potentially political. Starting from a
constructivist approach to identities and using the concept of boundary work
following Barth, Jenkins, Cohen, and Lamont, Aceska argues that the “them”
against which an “us” is erected is not always ethnically dened, as there are
other possible forms of otherness. In her case, the most salient divide is the one
between insiders-natives and outsiders-newcomers.
In his “Settlers, Natives, and Refugees: Classicatory Systems and the Con-
struction of Autochthony in Vojvodina” Gábor Basch begins by remarking that
although the notion of “autochthony” has become one of the main justications
for contemporary conicts in the Balkans and elsewhere, it has not been the
object of systematic studies as a social construction. He therefore sets out to
investigate the construction of settlers and natives as social categories, both
referring to the perception of autochthony, in two villages in Vojvodina, the
northern province of Serbia. ese categories are used by Serbian, Croatian
and Hungarian inhabitants to claim their condition as “more native” than the
others, in close connection with events in the distant or less distant past, such
as the creation and collapse of states and empires, shiing borders, and demo-
graphic change. Unwittingly echoing Aceska’s argument, Basch shows that it is
not at all times and in all contexts that the ethnic boundary dominates. At the
very least, ethnic claims necessarily intersect with and are articulated in the
language made available by a whole set of symbolic demarcations, contingent
upon the history and politics of the given place. In the villages studied by Basch,
the most important circumstances have been successive waves of immigration
where each arrival of fresh settlers brings natives of dierent ethnicities closer
together. In conclusion, the author points out the paradox that the histories of
Editors’ Introduction
11
Vojvodina in their Hungarian, Serb and Croatian versions are very dierent but
nevertheless mobilize the same constructs: expulsions, settlements, conquests
and re-conquests, border changes and the constant contesting of these changes.
e three papers grouped in the third section of the volume use the meth-
odological potentials of discursive and linguistic analysis to unpack the con-
ceptual black boxes of ethnicity and nation. Instead of assuming national (and
ethnic) identity as something known in advance, the authors ask how ethnicity
is lived, talked about, experienced, embraced, and resented by ordinary people
out there in the real social world. In the rst paper, “e Complexity of Ethnic
Stereotypes: A Study of Ethnic Boundaries among Serbian Youth” Tamara
Pavasović Trošt sets out to ll in a gap in the scholarly literature on ethnic
prejudice in the former Yugoslav lands. Although high degrees of ethnic dis-
tance among the young are generally found, the intensity, quality, and content
of ethnic boundaries and stereotypes are rarely scrutinized. Pavasović Trošt
presents the results of her study of teenage students in two Belgrade elementary
schools, using both quantitative and qualitative methods and complementing
sociological insights with fresh developments in psychology to arrive at a more
adequate understanding of how ethnic prejudice works among the young in
a post-conict society. Applying the stereotype content model (SCM) which
distinguishes between “warmth” and “competence” as two main dimensions
of attitude towards an ethnic other, the author shows that the simple ethnic
distance score may hide signicant dierences in content.
Vladan Pavlović and Miloš Jovanović’s paper “’Language Nationalism’ vs.
’Language Cosmopolitanism’: Divisions in the Attitudes towards the Relation
between Language and National Identity” starts by questioning the received
idea of a close coincidence between “language” and “nation”. Using a ques-
tionnaire administered to students of dierent departments at the University
of Niš, the authors examine the respondents’ views on the strength of the link
between linguistic and national identity (at the collective and individual levels),
with this link being conceptualized theoretically as ranging between “language
nationalism” and “language cosmopolitanism”. Pavlović and Jovanović look
for correlations with a set of sociological variables and nd that the expressed
attitudes depend the most on the respondent’s religiosity and eld of study.
Somewhat surprisingly, place of residence and birthplace did not have an eect,
while participants’ gender and parents’ education had a contradictory eect.
In terms of interdepartmental dierences, the hypothesis was conrmed that
English language students would hold a more “cosmopolitan” attitude on the
average than their colleagues from other departments and faculties, especially
the students of history and mechanical engineering.
Davor Marko in his “Power Constellation(s), Symbolic Divisions and Media:
Perception of Islam as a Personalized, ‘Minorized’ and Subordinated Part of
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
12
Serbian Society” aims to contribute to the ongoing debate on the role of media
language in setting and reshaping symbolic borders in plural societies, focusing
on the media treatment of the Bosniak/Muslim minority in Serbia. Linking
language, media discourse and power in the theoretical and methodological
framework of Critical Discourse Analysis, Marko comparatively analyzes two
samples: “primary discourse” issued by the Mui of Sandžak, Muamer Zukorlić,
and another of “secondary discourse” of Serbian mainstream media coverage
of these statements. Public language is used both by hegemonic structures and
by the minorities resisting these. In the given case, both sides use the technique
of othering when setting the border between “Us” and “em” and the author
targets the ways media language is used by the hegemon and by the margin-
alized groups, identifying especially the various tactics that both sides employ.
e nal group of papers has a focus on Serbia, where the three contribu-
tions examine symbolic forces at work in the turbulent process of producing, or
changing, the Serbian polity at this moment. Addressing the issue of symbolic
divisions in Serbia Ana Omaljev’s “Constructing the Other/s: Discourses on
Europe and Identity in ‘First’ and ‘Other’ Serbia” focuses on what is undoubtedly
the most consequential distinction in terms of its political eects, and that is the
story of the “two Serbias”. She explores the dierent views that actors identifying
with one or the other positions have held with regard to the Serbian nation and
Europe, as implicated in the confrontation between Self (Serbian Subject/State)
and Other (Europe). e author deconstructs the representational paradigms
used by both groups in the period aer the change of regime in 2000. e most
divisive topics have been the attitude towards the International Criminal Tri-
bunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the desirability of Serbia’s “European
way”. ese public debates among Serbia’s post-2000 elites are shown to refer
to rearticulating the notion of “Serbianness” and the place of Serbs in Europe
in order to legitimize these elites’ political decisions and foreign policy choices
in the present. e key argument of the paper is that “Europe” is a designated
sign of exclusion in these discourses. Methodologically, Omaljev follows the
ideas put forward by authors such as Hansen, Fraser and Wodak that national
identities are discursive constructions continuously (re)produced in the public
sphere, and that this process always entails plurality of voices, contradictions
and conict rather than harmony.
In the next paper, Ivana Spasić and Tamara Petrović (“Varieties of ird
Serbia”) continue the line of inquiry opened by Omaljev that concerns symbolic
dierentiations within the Serbian polity. ey uncover a recent development,
particularly visible since the mid-2000s, in the ongoing struggle between the
rival ways of imagining Serbia. e trend is the quest for a middle ground, a
conciliatory position between the First and Other Serbia, which is, sometimes
explicitly and sometimes not, called the “ird Serbia”. Some actors previously
Editors’ Introduction
13
identied with the “First” Serbia, and a few from the “Other” one, have found
this standpoint increasingly advantageous politically and defensible morally.
While these shis in many cases involve little more than a change in vocabulary,
with the stands on some crucial issues (like the prosecution of war crimes or
the treatment of minorities) remaining the same as before, Spasić and Petrović
argue that the process is not insignicant. It may be read as signaling a changing
political atmosphere in Serbia and marking a new stage in the consolidation of
democratic norms and habituation to pluralism, even if it be just in the form
of democratic etiquette. Words and symbols can never be irrelevant in politics,
the authors conclude.
Closing the collection, “Political capital and identities of Serbian citizens”
by Zoran Stojiljković questions the role of political culture, ideology and a set
of habits of political behavior on the part of both elites and citizens in shaping
the current condition and prospects of democracy in Serbia. Special attention
is paid to the contradictory implications of social capital – there is trust and
cooperation that makes problem solving easier at the collective level, but there
is also the potential for developing nepotism, cronyism and “amoral familism”
on the negative side.
We do hope that this book, given the breadth of topics it breaches, its inter-
disciplinary approach, its meshing of theory and empirical data, and its novel
ways of looking at the social reality in the Balkans, will make an inspiring
reading not only for students of the Balkans but also for all those scholars who
are interested in symbolic divisions and symbolic aspects of social life in general.
Ivana Spasić
Predrag Cvetičanin
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
14
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Lamont, Michèle and Virág Molnár, “e study of boundaries in the social
sciences”, Annual Review of Sociology 28 (2002): 167–95.
Lévi - Strauss, Claude, Structural Anthropology (New York: Basic Books, 1963).
Pachucki, Mark, Sabrina Pendergrass, and Michèle Lamont, “Boundary pro-
cesses: recent theoretical developments and new contributions” Poetics 35
(2007): 331–51.
Weber, Max, Economy and Society, ed. by G.Roth and C.Wittich (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1978).
EXCLUDING THE OTHER IN
THE BALKANS: FROM THE
OTTOMAN TURK TO LGBTIQ
19
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition and the
Formation of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy
Aleksandar Pavlović
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan
Oral Tradition and the Formation
of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy
Abstract:
e article approaches the question of political views promoted by oral tradition
through Carl Schmitt’s notion of politics as the distinction between friend and
enemy. It focuses on four versions of “Perović Batrić”, a comparatively short Mon-
tenegrin song with a typical subject of blood revenge, documented during the
rst half of the nineteenth century in Serbia, Montenegro and Herzegovina. It is
demonstated that the only version documented without any impact of the ruling
Montenegrin Petrović family from Cetinje displays explicit antagonism between
the Montenegrin and Herzegovinian Orthodox Christian tribes and has no explicit
antiturkish sentiment. In addition, two other versions written down from Monte-
negrin singers inuenced by Cetinje as the political centre show the consolidation
of political perspective and emphasize the hostilities between the Montenegrins
and the local Turks. True political character of the enemy in the Schmittian sense,
it is argued, is nally recognized only in the version of “Perović Batrić” edited by
the Montenegrin bishop-prince Petar Petrović Njegoš II. In this song, the hostility
towards Batrić’s adversary Osman follows not from his tribal conformity or his
distinctive personality, but from his “Turkishness” as such. It is therefore argued
that this recognition of the specically political character of the enemy occurred
under the increasing inuence of Cetinje (as the political centre) on the represen-
tation of the oral tradition and that nationalistic elements in oral tradition mainly
became associated with it, and inserted into it, during the process of publication
and canonization of the oral tradition in the rst half of the nineteenth century.
Key Words
Balkan oral tradition, “Perović Batrić”, politics, hostility, Carl Schmitt
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
20
Introduction: Politics as the Distinction
Between Friend and Enemy
is paper examines the formation of the Turk as the political enemy in the
Western Balkans around the mid-nineteenth century by focusing on the trans-
formation of the oral tradition in the region at the time under the inuence of
national ideology and political leadership. I will approach this issue drawing
on Carl Schmitt’s notion of the political. According to Schmitt, “a denition
of the political can be obtained only by discovering and dening the specif-
ically political categories” [1966: 25]. And such as “in the realm of morality
nal distinctions are between good and evil, in aesthetics beautiful and ugly,
in economics protable and unprotable… e specic political distinction
to which political actions and motives can be reduced is that between friend
and enemy” [Schmitt, 1966: 26]. In short, politics for Schmitt is the distinction
between friend and enemy.
Schmitt further distinguishes between the private or non-political aspect of
the friend/enemy relation, on the one hand, and its properly political character
on the other. Since, as he emphasizes, modern European languages do not dif-
ferentiate between the two, he illustrates this dierence by referring to the Latin
etymology of the words: “e enemy is hostis, not inimicus in the broader sense…
e oen quoted ‘Love your enemies’ reads … ‘diligite inimicos vestros’. No men-
tion is made of the political enemy” [1966: 28-9]. Schmitt considers the enemy
only in his political aspect: “the enemy is solely the political enemy” [1966: 28].
us, only the concept of the political enemy belongs to politics and denes it.
is approximation between the concept of the political enemy and politics
itself provides the broad framework for my topic. Essentially, I will follow the
emergence of the political enemy in Montenegrin epic poetry in the rst half of
the nineteenth century. My aim is to show that this recognition of the specically
political character of the enemy occurred under the increasing inuence of Cetinje
(as the Montenegrin political centre) on the representation of the oral tradition.
The Basis of Montenegrin Social History
Since I focus here on the territory of the present-day Montenegro, where oral
epic tradition was strongest and best documented, some further remarks are
needed. In the early nineteenth century, the people of Montenegro still lived
in a fragmented form of social organization. ey were separated into various
blood related clans of herders, further united in tribes on collectively owned
and shared territory [Đurđev: 1953]. Although a certain recognition of their
21
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition and the
Formation of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy
common Serbian origin and history could hardly be denied, the tribes also
nourished their distinctive local traditions and acted independently from or
against other tribes.
What enabled members of the Petrović family from Cetinje to gradually
establish political leadership was the fact that they held the hereditary posi-
tion of bishop, whose jurisdiction covered more or less the entire territory of
today’s Montenegro. Also, their tribe occupied the territory of Old Montenegro
closest to the Adriatic Coast, and thus economically more independent from
the Turks and protected from their direct inuence by the shield of so called
Brđani tribes on the east and the Herzegovinian tribes on the north. During the
time of Bishop Petar I, from 1782 to 1830, the foundations of the state were laid.
His followers, famous writer and collector of folk poetry Bishop Petar Petrović
Njegoš II (1831-1851), Prince Danilo (1852-1860) and nally Prince-King Nikola
(1860-1918), strengthened their inuence on other tribes and further consolidated
the state, which was formally recognized in 1878. But to create and maintain it,
the Petrovićs had to overcome not only the neighbouring Turks, predominantly
consisting, in fact, of the Islamized local population, but also internal tribal
antagonism and particularism. e unwritten law of blood revenge played a
special role in tribal separatism. is archaic custom demanded that any killed
member of a clan or tribe must be revenged by the killing of at least as many
people of the enemy clan or tribe. is oen lead to the cumulative growth of
killings on both sides, creating an atmosphere of general insecurity and gener-
ating brutal and long-lasting tribal wars and hostilities [Roberts 2007: 103-80].
I will examine a single song, comparatively short and focusing on the typical
subject of blood revenge, to show how under Petrović’s inuence the clan or tribal
enemy was transformed into the political enemy. e song was rst published
as “Perović Batrić” in Vuk Karadžić’s collection of folk songs in 1823. is was
at the same time the rst collection that contained Montenegrin songs about
relatively recent local events. Njegoš published a dierent version of the same
song, called “e Revenge of Batrić Perović” (“Osveta Batrića Perovića”), in
his collection of folk songs Serbian Mirror (Ogledalo srbsko) in 1846. Together
with two other, unpublished versions of this song recorded on Cetinje in 1836,
and in Herzegovina at some point aer 1846, this gives us enough material to
follow the emergence of the gure of the Turk as the political enemy during the
rst half of the nineteenth century.
All recorded versions have the same subject – Perović Batrić is captured by
Ćorović Osman. He oers Osman a ransom, but it is declined and he is killed.
Batrić’s brother gathers a company of men, ambushes and captures Osman
alive. Now Osman oers a rich ransom, but the brother refuses it and reveng-
es Batrić by cutting o Osman’s head. Vengeance is the crucial element of all
the versions. Aer Batrić’s murder, it is the father who demands revenge and
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
22
reminds his son of its mandatory character. Also, it is essential that Osman is
not just killed in an ambush, but that he is beheaded with the full knowledge of
who his killer is and whom he revenges. However, although all the songs share
these structural units, presentation of the events, evaluation of the characters
and overall perspective varies signicantly in dierent versions.1
Perović Batrić from Karadžić’s Collection
It is interesting that in the earliest recorded song, entitled Perović Batrić in
Karadžić’s 1823 collection, a Christian named Panto is the one who actually
kills Batrić. eir antagonism comes from their dierent tribal aliation. Batrić
belongs to the Cuce tribe from the territory of Old Montenegro, and Panto is,
like Osman, from the Herzegovinian tribe of Banjani. Panto intervenes in the
moment when Osman almost agrees to spare Batrić’s life in exchange for the
rich ransom. His explanation that all Batrić’s wealth comes from his pillaging of
their tribe moves gradually through three spheres. In the beginning, he articu-
lates what we could label as the sphere of luxury and identies it with the Turks:
“e immeasurable treasure that he oers
is treasure he took from the Turks,
Seven miquelets that he oers,
He recently stripped from the Turks;”
“Što ti daje nebrojeno blago,
Uzeo je blago od Turaka;
Što l’ ti daje sedam dževerdara,
S taki’ ih je skinuo Turaka;”2
[Karadžić 1986: 24]
Panto neither claims nor recognizes any direct personal and ethnic interest on
this level, and expresses it as independent and separated from him. His initial
address to Osman thus aims at those possessions identied with the Turks,
1 is consideration of the various versions has special relevance in the study of oral poetry.
Oral songs do not exist as xed text, but more like the basic story-plot or sequence of events
as I just described. Every singular performance is unique and depends on the individual
singer, local tradition and conditions of the recording [see: Lord 1960].
2 All translations into English are authors.
23
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition and the
Formation of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy
which serve as the foremost display of social and symbolic prestige and wealth.
In other words, Batrić’s unforgivable crime is that he denies the Turks their
social and military superiority.
In the second part of his speech, Panto moves on to the common level of
mutual interests and belonging:
“ose necklaces and earrings that he oers,
He will get aer capturing our daughters-in-law,
And strip necklaces and earrings from them.”
“Što ti daje v’jence i oboce,
On će naše snahe povatati,
Te će skidat’ v’jence i oboce.”
[Karadžić 1986: 24]
Referring to “our daughters-in-law”, he exposes Batrić as their common threat.
Panto also moves from the past to the future tense, which suggests that he is
less concerned with the righteous punishment of Batrić for his previous crimes
committed against the Turks than with the repercussions of Batrić’s future
actions on the more communal and collective level.
Finally, this concern also applies to his family sphere:
“For oering the slave-woman from Cuce,
He will capture my daughter,
And give her for his ransom.”
“Što ti daje Cuckinju robinju,
To će moju ćerku zarobiti
Te je dati za se u otkupa.”
[Karadžić 1986: 24]
erefore, Panto systematically presents Batrić as a threat to all social partic-
ipants – he endangers both the domination of the Turks and Panto’s family
security. e intersection of the two is recognized on the mediatory tribal level
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
24
of common identication, as the protection of “our” sisters-in-law, meaning the
females married to our tribesmen.
Certainly, neither tribal conformity nor hostility towards Batrić eradicates
the dierences between Panto and Osman or makes them indierent to their
respective social and religious positions. On the contrary, Batrić’s oer actually
induces Panto to formulate the dierence between them and to explicate their
separate interests. e point here is that for Panto the highest eective level of
the identication and recognition of common interests, the one that marks the
horizon of his actions, is the tribal one.
However, we should not overlook the voice of Christian and national unity
that appears in this song. Namely, the singer himself is not indierent towards
this fratricidal bloodshed. us, although Panto occupies a subject-position
and owns a voice, his speech is introduced with the curse “To hell with Panto
from Tupani!” (“Vrag donese od Tupana Panta”). erefore, authorial voice
clearly stigmatizes Panto for his disloyalty towards fellow Christians and his
coping with the Turks. In other words, although the higher level of national
unity is not operative in the plot, the singer himself recognizes it. is indicates
the existence of the broader perspective that transcends presented events and
unies Christian characters on the higher national level.
Since it would take us too far to trace this voice in detail, let it suce here to
connect it with the views transmitted from the political centre. is particular
song Karadžić recorded from the blind singer Đuro Milutinović in 1822 at Prince
Miloš’s court in Kragujevac, the capital of Serbia at the time. Milutinović was
born in Herzegovina and he settled at Prince Miloš’s court in 1808 aer serving
several years as the messenger between the Montenegrin ruler Bishop Petar I
and the leaders of the ongoing Serbian uprising against the Turks. Milutinović
was literate and quite knowledgeable and educated by the standards of his time.
He was respected among his contemporaries for his national service and praised
as the ‘living icon of the uprising’ (Durković-Jakšić 1952: 141-56). us, what
makes possible the dual voice in this song is that it has been recorded from a
literate, professional singer, an associate of Bishop Petar I and eager national-
ist who has lived and sung outside the local tradition for more than a decade.
Ljubomir Zuković, who wrote at length about all the songs recorded from this
singer, concluded that a certain duality is typical of Milutinović’s songs in general:
“In Đura’s songs traditional characteristics of folk songs and
collective views still dominate, but the songs also show the
inuence of the pedagogic work of Bishop Petar I, who tried
to give new spirit and more modern national and liberating
orientation to this poetry” [Zuković 1988: 143].
25
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition and the
Formation of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy
What makes this example particularly valuable is that here those two voices are
obviously incompatible. Panto is accused of being a traitor but, paradoxically,
at the same time given a voice that explains and justies his actions and im-
mediately disqualies the implicit ultimate request and demand for national/
religious solidarity that stands behind the curse. In other words, the immediacy
of Batrić as a threat directs Panto towards Osman and their association on the
tribal level. Certainly, Osman is recognized as privileged in social and nancial
status and wealth. But Panto also expresses certain expectations and demands,
and reminds Osman of his obligations. Namely, Panto confronts his intention
to accept Batrić’s oer for ransom that is, indeed, protable for Osman, since
it increases his personal wealth. But although Batrić is Osman’s captive, Panto
denies him the right to make a sovereign decision over his life and to act solely
for his own benet. Osman is obliged to protect the interests of his fellow Turks,
of the Banjani tribe, and nally of Panto himself. us, Panto confronts Osman,
gives his speech and kills Batrić without waiting for an answer or a permission
from Osman. Panto’s speech oers, therefore, a quite elaborate explanation of
this loose tribal association that is, to be sure, not without its own internal an-
tagonisms and tensions. Nothing remotely as elaborate as this tribal voice exists
on the level of national unity, which is limited to the single authorial comment.
To summarize, ambiguous relations among the characters and an overlap be-
tween the private and the public aspect of their actions dominate in the song,
thus defying clear-cut distinctions and disabling political conceptualization of
the enemy in the Schmittian sense.
Before moving to the song published in Njegoš’s collection, I will briey men-
tion two versions from Karadžić’s manuscripts, recorded in 1836 and sometime
aer 1846, respectively. Although both were collected from traditional tribal
singers, their overall perspective is radically dierent.
Perović Batrić from Karadžić’s Manuscripts
A version with an even more explicit tribal antagonism between Christians is
called “Again Perović Batrić” (“Opet Perović Batrić”) in Karadžić’s manuscripts.
is song describes the members of the Perović clan not by reference to their
tribal allegiance, but more generally as being from Montenegro:
“Young Montenegrins are looking at him
And so he escaped to Montenegro…”
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
26
“Gledaju ga mladi Crnogorci …
Pa uteče u Goricu Crnu”.
[Karadžić 1974: 38]
e song presents the vengeance of Batrić’s brother Vuk as directed towards the
whole tribe, without explicit dierentiation between Christians and Muslims:
“He gathered thirty Perovićs
With them he went to the Banjani tribe
To revenge his dear brother”.
He slashed thirty Banjani
All notable and valiant”.
“On pokupi trides’ Perovića,
Šnjima ode u pleme Banjane
Na osvetu mila brata svoga”.
On posječe trideset Banjana,
Sve boljega i valjanijega”.
[Karadžić 1974: 39]
However, the brother is still dissatised and continues the pursuit for six weeks
until he nally kills Osman. e song concludes with a seemingly contradictory
and unmotivated act. On his way home, Vuk meets his blood brother Marko
Kovačević from Grahovo, who asks him whether he has revenged his brother.
Vuk responds:
“In revenge for my sweet brother
I slashed thirty four
noteworthy members of Banjani,
and I brought Osman’s head with me,
But I haven’t found a head in Banjani
To match the one of my Batrić
Apart from yours, my dear blood brother:
27
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition and the
Formation of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy
Indeed, I will slash you today
In revenge for my sweet brother!”
“Ja osvetih mila brata moga,
Zanj posjekoh trides’ i četiri,
sve boljega iz Banjana, Marko,
I donijek sa Osmana glavu,
Al’ ne nađoh u Banjane glave
Kao bješe u Batrića moga,
Izvan tvoja, dragi pobratime —
Danas ću te, bogme, posijeći
Da osvetim mila brata moga!”
[Karadžić 1974: 40-41]
Marko thinks that Vuk is joking and oers him a drink, but Vuk cuts o his
head in cold blood and returns to Montenegro.
It might seem that the demands of blood vengeance oer a certain explanation
for this act. As Karadžić writes in the aforementioned book on Montenegro: “If
the culprit is some irrelevant man, then the revenge is not performed partic-
ularly over him, but over some more respectable person” [Karadžić 1922: 44].
A similar situation is described by the famous warrior Marko Miljanov in his
book Primjeri čojstva i junaštva (Heroic Examples): “Such a custom it was to
revenge even the worst of yours with the best, for if one would kill the poor for
revenge, people would mock him” [1930: 49]. erefore, the bare multitude of
killed Banjani is not enough if the revenge fails to nd an adequate match for
the hero. Only aer having killed Marko, is Batrić’s brother satised. However,
no rationale can truly justify the killing of Marko, who is, as it appears, actually
Vuk’s blood brother from the neighbouring Herzegovinian tribe of Grahovo
and, as such, should be exempt from vengeance. e fact that they are blood
brothers shows that no religious, ethnic, national or personal friendship and
solidarity can disrupt the brutal economy of Montenegrin blood vengeance. In
other words, no one, not even a blood brother from another tribe, is excluded
as a possible foe and victim of the Montenegrins.
us, like the previous song, this version also fails to conceptualize the ene-
my in his proper political aspect. On the general level, we might say, the singer
relates the song whose subject is the successful vengeance of the Perovićs, which
would suggest his solidarity with the Montenegrins. On the other hand, the song
also emphasizes the excess of the Montenegrin revenge and nishes with the
explicit criticism of the Montenegrins, thus indicating the singer’s solidarity with
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
28
the Banjani tribe. Again, we see similar shiing and uctuating friend/enemy
positions and absence of their political conceptualization as in the rst song.
It appears unusual that this version with explicit tribal antagonism is actu-
ally the most recent recorded one. e exact date of its recording is uncertain,
but it was Njegoš’s decision to monopolize the songs and the singers during
his preparation of the Serbian Mirror that forced one of Karadžić’s associates
to search for the songs outside the territory of Njegoš’s immediate political
control. e collector received it sometime aer 1846, by all likelihood from
the Herzegovinian peasant Stojan Kandić from Grahovo during one of the
singer’s regular visits to the market in the coastal town of Risan in the Kotor
bay [Karadžić 1993: 35].
On the other hand, the unpublished song recorded in Cetinje in 1836, entitled
Perović Batrić in Karadžić’s manuscripts, explicitly praises the Montenegrins
and elevates the events to the more general level of the conict between the
Montenegrins and the neighbouring Turks. Again, instead of specifying Batrić’s
tribal allegiance, the singer describes him at the beginning as being “from spa-
cious upland Montenegro” (“od prostrane lomne Crne Gore”). Accordingly, a
company gathered by Batrić’s brother is not limited to the clan members: “He
gathered young Montenegrins” (“pokupi mlade Crnogorce”). Also, the singer
situates the story around Nikšić, which is a more urban area inhabited pre-
dominantly by a Muslim population and species that only the Turks are the
subjects of the vengeance:
„ere comes thirty Turks
From the white town of Nikšić“
(…)
“Montenegrin guns had red
And killed thirty Turks.”
“Ali ide trideset Turaka
Od Nihšića grada bijeloga”
(…)
„Crnogorske puške popucale
I ubiše trideset Turaka.”
[Karadžić 1974: 37]
29
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition and the
Formation of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy
As in Karadžić’s published version, in this song Osman is also ready to accept
Batrić’s oer, but here the complaint comes not from a Christian, but from the
loc a l Tu rk s:
“Eight miquelets which he now oers,
Batrić stripped from the Turks;
Twelve necklaces that he speaks about,
ey grabbed from Muslim women!”
“Što ti daje osam džeferdarah,
To je Batrić skinuo s Turakah;
Što ti kaže dvanajes’ đerdanah,
To su oni s bulah ujagmili!”
[Karadžić 1974: 37]
erefore, this version renes the revenge that progresses to the level of the
Montenegrins in general: not in a national sense, of course, but as a common
denominator for the tribes from the territory of Old Montenegro. Also, both
Batrić and his avengers limit their actions only to the local Muslims/Turks.
Consequently, no Christian characters participate on the other side and no
mention is made of Montenegrin brutality over Herzegovinian Christians.
us, the greatest dierence of this version in comparison to the previous is
the radically dierent portrayal of the Montenegrins. Contrary to the critique
of their behaviour in previous versions, here the Montenegrins are openly
gloried for their heroism. Certainly, the conict still has only local meaning
and importance, and its wider national dimension could hardly be recognized.
Still, compared with the previous versions, this song evidently consolidates the
political perspective in the specic context of the frontier tribes, dividing the
characters into two hostile camps according to their religious allegiance and
the territory they inhabit.
is version was recorded from Todor Ikov Piper, a tribal singer and not a
Montenegrin in the narrow sense. Since his views dier from the ones previ-
ously described, we need to pay attention to the conditions of his performance
to eectively explain this dierence. Karadžić received this song directly from
Njegoš. In 1836, Njegoš called for the traditional singer Todor Ikov to be brought
to Cetinje, where under Njegoš’s supervision dozens of his songs were recorded
and sent to Karadžić. In one letter to Karadžić, Njegoš describes him as illiterate,
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
30
uneducated “simple Serbian” (“prosti Srbin”). If indeed Todor Ikov was simple,
he surely was clever enough to understand the demands and the prole of his
audience. Singing his version on Cetinje, the religious and political centre of
Montenegro, and in the presence of Njegoš, other members of Petrović family
and local leaders, he made sure to perform it in a manner that would be appro-
priate and appealing to their ears.
Perović Batrić from Njegoš’s collection
Finally, the song “Osveta Batrića Perovića” from Njegoš’s collection, published
in 1846, with its rigorous ethics and advanced level of religious and ethnic
identication, seems to be an almost direct response to the tribal antagonism
and particularism of the earlier versions.
is song goes further in the portrayal of both Osman’s inhumanity and
Batrić’s heroism. Namely, while other songs simply begin with the fact that
Batrić is in Osman’s dungeon, the version from Njegoš’s collection emphasizes
that Osman caught him by deceit, oering him hospitality and fraternity and
then breaking these sacred codes:
“Osman lured him on the promise
of his good faith and fraternity.”
“Na vjeru ga Osman prevario,
A na vjeru i na pobratimstvo.”
[Njegoš 1977: 20]
Also, aer the disgraceful capture Osman brutally tortures his captive. Batrić
pleads not so much for his life as for a dignied form of death:
“Osman Ćorović, my brother in God,
slay me with the sword
or murder me with the re from a holster
kill me as a warrior/hero,
not through pains and torture!
If you do not want to kill me,
put me on ransom, you Turk”.
31
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition and the
Formation of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy
“Bogom brate, Ćorović Osmane,
posjeci me sabljom ćemerlijom
– ali ubij puškom iz kuburah –
umori me smrću ka junaka,
Nemoj mene mukama mučiti!
Ako li me izgubiti nećeš,
Meći mene, Ture, na otkupe”.
[Njegoš 1977: 20]
ese lines develop two new motifs. e rst is Batrić’s heroism – he is not
addressing Osman to avoid death itself, but its dishonorable form – the proper
death for a hero is by a sword or a gun, while torture belongs to traitors and
criminals.
Another innovative element in this song is the negative presentation of Osman
as representative for the Turks in general. Osman intentionally and sadistically
humiliates his captive despite his plea. More so, Batrić’s opening words “My
brother in God” (“Bogom brate”) indicate the sacred form of his appeal, so called
“fraternity in hardship” (“pobratimstvo u nevolji”). According to the customs,
when someone who is in trouble calls you a brother in the name of God, even
when he is a defeated enemy that you are about to kill, you are obliged to obey
his request and spare his life, because by this simple phrase he made you his
blood brother. To what extent it applied to the actual state of aairs is a dierent
issue, but this plea is a quite common motif in South Slavic epic songs. us
their fraternity is activated twice, rst through Osman’s oer and invitation,
and then by Batrić’s plea. e singer explicitly refers to that:
“But the Turk knows no oath,
He tortures his blood brother Batrić
With even greater pains,
And kills him through torture”.
“Ali Turčin boga ne poznaje,
no Batrića muči pobratima,
i muke mu više udario,
na muke mu život izvadio.”
[Njegoš 1977: 21]
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
32
Unlike other versions, this song therefore particularly emphasises Osman’s
evilness and blasphemy as a consequence of his religious background: ‘e Turk
knows no oath’ (‘Turčin boga ne poznaje’). e Turk is, therefore, the enemy who
cannot be trusted – he captures Batrić by deceit (‘on the promise of good faith
and fraternity’ – ‘na vjeru i na pobratimstvo’), granting him security according
to the sacred, universal laws. Furthermore, Osman’s evilness is identied in the
rst instance with his religious allegiance – he commits sacrilege because he is
the Turk, an indel who knows no moral and human laws.
is identication of the enemy on the religious level is systematically con-
ducted throughout the song. Batrić’s brother comforts the father reminding him
that he has seven more sons and indicates the possibility of the compensation
for his life:
“If the old customs are followed,
e Turks will pay us for Batrić.”
“ako bude staroga taliha,
Turci će ni platiti Batrića!”
[Njegoš 1977: 21]
e father responds severely, calling him a girl (i. e. a coward) and reminds him
that the only proper compensation is blood revenge:
“Hush, you girl in my dear son’s stead,
Had all seven of you been killed
And Batrić the sword remained,
He would have revenged you all.”
“Muč, đevojko, a ne mio sine,
a svi sedam da ste poginuli,
da je sablja Batrić ostanuo,
Svijeh bi ve Batrić osvetio!”
[Njegoš 1977: 21]
33
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition and the
Formation of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy
Consequently, describing the brother’s revenge, the singer indicates the tribal
conformity of his victims, but species their ethnicity: “and he slashes the Turks
from Banjani” [“i siječe po Banjanah Turke”, Njegoš 1977: 21]. By analogy, explicit
mention of the Turks from Banjani as the sole target of the revenge implies that
the Christians from Banjani are, and should be, exempt from it.
ereby in this context the revenge itself aquires new and distinctive char-
acteristics. While other versions describe essentially tribal conicts, Osveta
Batrića Perovića insists on the gure of the Turk as a public, political enemy. e
necessity of blood revenge is presented here as a general political message: there
can be no reliance and no negotiation with the Turks, and no compensation
except bloody revenge. In other words, the atomizing tendency of blood revenge
is transformed into a device of unication and cohesion against the religious
and ethnic enemy. rough the characters of Osman and Batrić, this version
shows nal establishment of a proper political distinction in Schmittian sense.
orough analysis of Njegoš’s editorial process and his personal contribution
in the songs he published would require a separate investigation. Let it suce
here to mention that, unlike Karadžić, Njegoš gives no information about his
singers and makes no elds recordings. He simply says that once someone sung
a good song on Cetinje, local scribes would record it [Njegoš 1977: 11]. In other
words, Njegoš not only species that the songs were collected exclusively at
Cetinje, but somehow implicitly conrms that they were written down only if
they were appealing to the local political elite. Such an approach points to the
political tendency of Njegoš’s editorial work and an intrusive approach to the
songs he collected, both of which has been widely discussed in previous schol-
arship [Kilibarda: 1977: 485-90; 1998, Aubin: 1972, Lavrov: 1963, Putilov: 1982].
is suggests that his collection represents particular political views rather than
actually documenting an oral traditon. In any case, what the previous analysis
of the earlier and later recorded versions testies is that this advanced political
perspective was articulated only under Njegoš’s full monopoly over the entire
procedure of the representation of the oral folk tradition.
It is at this point, as I hope, that the Schmittian dictum reveals its full rel-
evance in this context. For Schmitt, the state is the place, and the birthplace,
of politics: “e concept of the state presupposes the concept of the political”
[1966: 19]. ere is no politics prior to the state or apart from it.
Conclusion
A comparative analysis of the above versions shows the emergence of the polit-
ical enemy in Montenegrin epic poetry during the rst half of the nineteenth
century. What disables this conceptualization in the two songs analyzed rst
Us and Them - Symbolic Divisions in Western Balkan Societies
34
is, one could argue, the enemy’s ambiguity or, in another way, his immediacy
and ubiquity. ere is, as in the rst song, the presence and domination of the
local Turks, whose relations to their subjected Christians are ambiguous and
uncertain. But there is also, on the other hand, the immediate threat from the
adjoining Montenegrins, who can invade the household or suddenly transform
from blood brothers into killers. e third and the forth song eectively avoid
this problem by presenting exclusively the conict between the Montenegrins
and the neigbouring Turks. As indicated, Todor Ikov still presents nothing
more than the local conict, supplementing it perhaps with a certain implicit
appraisal of the Montenegrin heroism in general. In his version, Osman and
the Turks from Nikšić are foes of Batrić and his clan, and their hostility has
no signicant political implications It is only in Njegoš’s edition that the true
political character of the enemy is fully recognized. Hostility towards Osman
follows not from his tribal conformity or his distinctive personality, but from
his ‘Turkishness’ as such.
My conclusion also concerns the way this conceptualization of the enemy in
Montenegrin epic poetry is achieved. Out of four versions analyzed, only the one
recorded aer 1846 was documented without the inuence of or mediation from
Cetinje. It displays an explicit antagonism towards the Montenegrins and has
hardly anything to do and to say about the Turks. e three other songs show
the increasing inuence of the Petrovićs during the rst half of the nineteenth
century. In the earliest song, published in 1823, the impact of the political centre
on the oral tradition is still weak and circumstantial. It was argued that this
unifying national perspective is limited to the single authorial comment which
is an external element that contradicts the prevailing traditional perspective.
As indicated, Todor Ikov’s version from 1836 was already recorded under the
direct supervision of the Petrovićs. It was performed on Cetinje in the presence
of the ruler and his family members. But although it shows the consolidation of
the political standpoint, the traditional singer limits his scope and the overall
perspective to the local and tribal level. Finally, Osveta Perovića Batrića from
Njegoš’s collection completes this process of Petrovićs inuence over the entire
procedure of the literary representation of local oral tradition.
is takes us to the more general question of the reasons and ways that made
Serbian epics the national narrative during Romantic nationalism and, up to
this day, such a strong source of nationalistic feelings. My lapidary answer to
this question would be that there is no politics inherent to Serbian epic tradition,
no politics of oral tradition as such. e politics of Serbian epic poetry is the
politics associated with it, and inserted into it, during the process of publica-
tion and canonization of the oral tradition in the rst half of the nineteenth
century. Under the increasing inuence of the political centre, in this period
the eld of Serbian epic poetry suered, as Schmitt would say, “one of those
35
Naming/Taming the Enemy: Balkan Oral Tradition and the
Formation of “the Turk” as the Political Enemy
high points of politics” when “the enemy is, in concrete clarity, recognized as
the enemy” [1966: 67].
is conclusion raises a number of questions – was it inevitable for the epic
tradition to become associated with, and to become a source of, this kind of
politics? Can we undo this process by rediscovering oral tradition without this
dri? Is it possible to associate Serbian epic poetry with a radically dierent kind
of politics, be it liberal politics or, which seems more productive to me, with the
reconguration of the political eld through the concept of friendship developed
in Deridda’s Politics of Friendship? Of course, answers to those questions would
require another journey. But on my account, the initial step for this journey is
to present the epic gure of the political enemy as contingent and invented and
thus to deny its necessity and unnaturalize its characteristics.
References:
Aubin, Michel, Visions historiques et politiques dans l'oeuvre poétique de P.P.
Njegoš (Paris: Université de Paris-Sorbonne / Belgrade: Faculte de philologie,
1972).
Banašević, Nikola, “Pesme o najstarijoj crnogorskoj istoriji u ‘Pjevaniji’ Sime
Milutinovića”, X (Zbornik radova, Beograd: Institut za proučavanje književ-
nosti (1951), 281-299.
Đurđev, Bra nislav, Turska vlast u Crnoj Gori u XVI i XVII veku (Sarajevo: Svje-
tlost, 1953).
Durković-Jakšić, Ljubomir, “Đura Milutinović (1770-1844)”, (III Istorijski časopis,
organ Istorijskog instituta SANU (1952), 141-156.
Karadžić, Vuk Stefanović, Crna Gora i Boka Kotorska, (Beograd: Srpska Knji-