March Meeting of the AEES (March 22nd, 2003 at the University of Tokyo)

I was asked to speak about Slovene identity. On one side how it was formed, on the second how it was changing and on the third how it has been and how it is still today presented in the school textbooks. I will try to deal with these issues by presenting the main characteristics of the Slovene development and pointing out, how the Slovene views about the national past were constructed, how the tradition and the symbols were invented and how and when the criteria of the Slovene nationhood were conceived. I will also try to point at the key historical facts, which in different past periods became constituant elements of Slovene self-identification and collective self-image. And I will on the end expose some problems, which today particularly young people feel, confronted with the process of cultural globalization and trying to form their own feelings of belonging to their ethnic group defined by language and culture on one side and to the gobal village/world they also feel attracted and attached to on the other.

Slovenes have, as well known, unlike the Czechs, Poles, Serbs or Croats, no "glorious" history. At the beginning of the 20th the early medieval Karantania, which had been formed partly on the territory Slovenes live on today, was by Slovene artists and historians proclaimed for the medieval Slovene state. Its remnant, the "princefs stone", on which Carinthian princes and dukes were installed, was declared to be a symbol of medieval, unfortunatelly lost Slovene national statehood and it became a popular, although officially never recognized national emblem. The princefs stone is thus still today presented in all the history textbooks. But the historians today know, that Karantania was a Slav and not a Slovene state. Thus not the princes and dukes, but the authors of first Slovene books and later poets and writers became Slovene national heroes. The Slovene national program was formulated in 1848 by a small group of educated men, who demanded that Slovene ethnic territory - hitherto split administratively- to be comined into "unified Slovenia". They conceived their unified Slovenia as an autnomous, self governing unit within the framework of the multinational Habsbug Monarchy. One of the fundamental characteristics of this autonomy was to be the free use of the Slovene language in offices, schools and public life. This was to be the Slovene national and political program also in the first and second Yugoslavia and Slovene intelectuals changed it to the demand for a fully independant state only under the influence of the growing Serbian nationalism and deep yugoslav political and economic crisis in the second half of 1980s.

The only national symbol, the Slovenes had since 1848 was their flag. Their national and political leaders therefore already in 19th century claimed that language and culture represented the foundation of Slovene national identity. These remained the main criteria of the Slovene nationhood also in the 20th century. Even in Yugoslavia ? like most of the other in the yugoslav state included ethnic groups ? the great majority of Slovenes felt first Slovenes and only in the second place Yugoslavs. After 1945 Yugoslav and Slovene communist leaders were trying to add to the national identities of particular yugoslav nations, including Slovenes a new element, that would strenghten their links and contribute to the formation of a common yugoslav identity: this was the memmory of the resistance against the German and Italian occupation during World War II. With Yugoslavia falling apart this however lost its importance. The Slovene national feelings of belonging were thus supposed also after 1991 and Slovene independence to be in the first place based on "language, history and culture".

The main historical events of national history ? also presented in the schoolbooks - are thus supposed to be: the Medieval Karantania; the Protestant literary activities and the publishing of the first Slovene books in 16th century; the "national awakaning in 18. century" with Pohlin, Linhart and other authors; the period of Romanticism with the poet France Pre?ern; 1848 and the formulation of the Slovene national program; the Slovene "fin de siecle" with the writer Ivan Cankar; 1918, the demise of the Habsburg Monarchy and the formation of the Yugoslav Kingdom; 1941-1945 World War II, resistance against occupation and the communist revolution which resulted in the civil war; 1945 and the formation of communist Yugoslavia; 1991, Communist Yugoslavia falling appart and the formation of an independent Slovenia.

What today such a historic experience and an identity based on language and culture mean to young people is a question for which the authors of this paper does not have an aswer. The national ideology which insists on the "language, culture and history" as criteria of Slovene nationhood is today less and less persuading. In Slovenia live today more than 10% of population, which does not have Slovene ethnic origins and wich have strong feelings of belonging to Slovene state, but do not speak Slovene language. On the other side particularly young people feel very much attracted by the Western culture and the process of globalization.