engleski

The Image(s) of South-Eastern and East-Central Europe throughout History

It is well known that in the last years a new division of Europe emerged – the North-South division. However, although many East European countries have entered the European Union starting with 2004, it seems that the old division West-East still functions in these times of prolonged economic crisis. Consequently, one of our conference's aims was to insert itself in the very relevant debate on East Europeans („the Other Europe“) between the critique of „Euro-Orientalism“ led by Eduard Said and Maria Todorova, and the opponents of this critique, and to enrich it (the debate) with its own results. The second perspective proposed by the conference was that of the countries of South-East and East-Central Europe themselves on their region(s). There was reason to assume, at least as a working hypothesis, that the view on the region differed from country to country, offering insight in the interesting reasons of those differences and in the images and stereotypes of their neighbors. It was also interesting to learn about the image(s) of the above mentioned regions created more towards the East, namely in Russia and Japan. Last but not least, it was intended to also take into consideration „the inverted perspective“: the image(s) of the West, of "Europe" in South-Eastern and East-Central Europe – this was our special session. This topic has become quite relevant over the last years, particularly because of the integration of a part of the countries of the region into the European Union.

Image of the Other; history; anthropology; imagology; South-Eastern Europe; East-Central Europe

The ANNALES PILAR/AIESEE Annual Conference 2013, held in Zagreb, October 25th to 26th. Co- organizers of this international conference: the Croatian National Committee of the AIESEE and the "Ivo Pilar" Institute of Social Sciences, Zagreb, which was also the conference venue. Turnout: about 40 delegates representing academies, universities, and scientific institutes from 11 countries ; experts in various disciplines: historians, anthropologists, historians of literature, and philologists.