The Myth of Greater Albania

The Myth of Greater Albania PDF Author: Paulin Kola
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 9780814747735
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 416

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Book Description
When Kosovar Albanians came to Albania after the fall of Communism, they were surprised to find an impoverished motherland whose people were consumed with questions of basic survival. Albania's citizens, for their part, were dumbstruck by the relatively opulent lifestyles of the Kosovars. Yet despite their profound differences, the myth of a "Greater Albania" persists. In this timely book, Paulin Kola challenges this myth, arguing that there is not widespread support for a "Greater Albania" among the Albanian-speaking peoples. He shows that Albanians do not wish to join a single, politically recognized entity and demonstrates how the Albanians are marked by ideological, religious, and other divisions. While a "Greater Kosovo" remains a remote possibility, there is little chance of the Albanians of either Albania or the diaspora supporting moves to dissolve the present international borders in pursuit of an "Albanian homeland." Albanians appear content to retain their discrete political entities, while traveling and trading freely. Accessible and urgent, this book effectively puts to rest the cherished myths of Albanian nationalism.

The Myth of Greater Albania

The Myth of Greater Albania PDF Author: Paulin Kola
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 9780814747735
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 416

Get Book

Book Description
When Kosovar Albanians came to Albania after the fall of Communism, they were surprised to find an impoverished motherland whose people were consumed with questions of basic survival. Albania's citizens, for their part, were dumbstruck by the relatively opulent lifestyles of the Kosovars. Yet despite their profound differences, the myth of a "Greater Albania" persists. In this timely book, Paulin Kola challenges this myth, arguing that there is not widespread support for a "Greater Albania" among the Albanian-speaking peoples. He shows that Albanians do not wish to join a single, politically recognized entity and demonstrates how the Albanians are marked by ideological, religious, and other divisions. While a "Greater Kosovo" remains a remote possibility, there is little chance of the Albanians of either Albania or the diaspora supporting moves to dissolve the present international borders in pursuit of an "Albanian homeland." Albanians appear content to retain their discrete political entities, while traveling and trading freely. Accessible and urgent, this book effectively puts to rest the cherished myths of Albanian nationalism.

The Albanian National Question and the Myth of Greater Albania

The Albanian National Question and the Myth of Greater Albania PDF Author: United States Army War College
Publisher: CreateSpace
ISBN: 9781497498242
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 32

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Book Description
In order to know what the Albanian National Question (ANQ) is, one should learn it not from what its neighbors, namely Serbia and Greece, have to say, but from a more direct and reliable source, the voice of the Albanians themselves. No nation is in a position in which it can express in a realistic way the needs, the rights and aspirations of a different nation in the same way as an individual cannot be an exact representative for someone but himself. For many years the Western countries used to rely on either Serbian or Greek lenses for the ANQ. In the late 1990s the U.S.-led intervention against Serbia over Kosova on humanitarian grounds and the Albanian insurgency in Macedonia has contributed to an altered power balance in the region. The neighbors frightened by the power shift in the Southern Balkans use their propaganda machinery to express the danger posed by the alleged Greater Albania scheme in order to demonize and morally downgrade the ANQ. However, one can easily see that Albanians since the creation of their state have not, are not, and will not pursue an irredentist agenda toward their neighbors.

The Search for Greater Albania

The Search for Greater Albania PDF Author: Paulin Kola
Publisher: C. Hurst & Co. Publishers
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 444

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Book Description
In this topical text Paulin Kola challenges the accepted notion that there is widespread support for a Greater Albania among the Albanian-speaking peoples of the Balkans, and argues that Albanians do not wish to join a single, politically-recognized entity. He explains how the Albanians are marked by ideological, religious and other divisions, many of which were exacerbated by their differing reactions to nationalism, as experienced in Tito's Yugoslavia and Hoxha's Albania.

Albanian Identities

Albanian Identities PDF Author: Stephanie Schwandner-Sievers
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 9780253341891
Category : Albania
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Book Description
The contributors to this study critically de-construct Albanian myths and offer insights into Albanian history and politics. They conclude with contemporary Albanian critiques of the origins and functions of Albanian politics and ideologies.

A Dictionary of Albanian Religion, Mythology, and Folk Culture

A Dictionary of Albanian Religion, Mythology, and Folk Culture PDF Author: Robert Elsie
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 9780814722145
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 384

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Book Description
In some senses, Albania is a living museum of the past. Originally a small herding community in the most inaccessible reaches of the Balkans, the presence of Albanians in southeastern Europe has been documented for over a thousand years. Albanian traditional folk culture, which evolved over centuries of relative isolation, is surprisingly rich. Yet despite recent events this culture remains little known to the Western world. Due to the lasting effects of a half century of Stalinist dictatorship, very few individuals even in Albania know much about their own popular traditions. The Dictionary of Albanian Religion, Mythology, and Folk Culture makes available for the first time a wealth of knowledge about Albanian popular belief and folk customs. Alphabetical entries shed light on blood feuding, figures of Albanian mythology, religious beliefs, communities, and sects, calendar feasts and rituals, and popular superstitions, as well as birth, marriage, and funeral customs, and sexual mores. This unique volume will stand as the standard reference work on the subject for years to come.

Myths and Mythical Spaces

Myths and Mythical Spaces PDF Author: Claudia Lichnofsky
Publisher: V&R unipress GmbH
ISBN: 3737008116
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 277

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Book Description
This volume addresses textbooks written in the Albanian language and in use in Albania, Kosovo, Macedonia and Serbia. Political myths and mythical spaces play a key role in shaping processes of identity-building, concepts of ‘self’ and ‘other’, and ideas pertaining to the location of the self and nation within a post-conflict context. The Albanian case is particularly interesting because the majority of Albanians live outside the borders of Albania, despite the existence of the nation-state, which gives rise to fascinating complexities regarding the shaping of national identities and myths surrounding concepts of ‘self’ and ‘other’. What textbooks teach is always of political interest, as they represent society’s intentions for its next generation. This renders identity-building processes via textbooks in this context a particularly fascinating topic for research, here examined through the lens of myths and mythical spaces.

Rebels, Believers, Survivors

Rebels, Believers, Survivors PDF Author: Noel Malcolm
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192599232
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 480

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Book Description
Thanks to its half-century under Communism, as well as its little-known language, Albania has suffered from neglect and a sense of isolation. Yet, as this study helps to show, the Albanian lands have a long history of interaction with others. They have been a meeting-ground of Christianity and Islam; a channel through which Venice connected with the Ottoman Balkans; a place of interest to the Habsburgs; and a focus for the ambitions of neighbouring powers in the late Ottoman period. Albanians themselves could have many different identities. The studies in this volume, by one of the world's leading experts on Albanian history, range from the fifteenth century to the twentieth, taking in politics, social history, religion and diplomacy. Each is based on original research; the longest, on Ali Pasha, uses a wealth of manuscript material to tell, for the first time, the full story of the vital role he played in the international politics of the Napoleonic Wars. Other studies bring to life ordinary individuals hitherto unknown to history: women hauled before the Inquisition, for example, or the author of the first Albanian autobiography. Some of these studies have been printed before (several in hard-to-find publications, and one only in Albanian), but the greater part of this book appears here for the first time. This is not only a landmark publication for readers interested in south-east European history. It also engages with many broader issues, including religious conversion, 'crypto-Christianity' among Muslims, methods of enslavement within the Ottoman Empire, and the nature of modern myth-making about national identity.

Kosovo

Kosovo PDF Author: Tim Judah
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 9780300097252
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 410

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Book Description
Om det spændte forhold mellem albanere og serbere i Kosovo, som har eksisteret siden middelalderen, og som til sidst førte til NATOs bombardement og Kosovos forvandling fra serbisk provins til internationalt protektorat

Decoding Albanian Organized Crime

Decoding Albanian Organized Crime PDF Author: Jana Arsovska
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520282809
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 310

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Book Description
The expansion of organized crime across national borders has become a key security concern for the international community. In this theoretically and empirically vibrant portrait of a global phenomenon, Jana Arsovska examines some of the most widespread myths about the so-called Albanian Mafia. Based on more than a decade of research, including interviews with victims, offenders, and law enforcement across ten countries, as well as court files and confidential intelligence reports, Decoding Albanian Organized Crime presents a comprehensive overview of the causes, codes of conduct, activities, migration, and structure of Albanian organized crime groups in the Balkans, Western Europe, and the United States. Paying particular attention to the dynamic relationships among culture, politics, and organized crime, the book develops a framework for understanding the global growth of the criminal underworld and provides a model for future comparative research.

Eternal Butrint

Eternal Butrint PDF Author: Richard Hodges
Publisher: Butrint Foundation
ISBN: 9781905680016
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 255

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Book Description
Located at a crossroads in the Mediterranean, the site of Butrint is a microcosm of changes in the region over the last 3,000 years. Few UNESCO World Heritage Sites command such scientific interest - and few are more richly documented. Set in a marshy landscape between an inland lagoon and the busy straits separating Corfu and Albania, Butrint boasts well-preserved, photogenic remains from most periods. The site has been occupied since at least the 8th century BC, and Virgil recounts how the Trojan exile, Aeneas, landed here before he founded Rome. Subsequent travellers have all recognised an elegiac beauty in the site. This book charts the development and change of Butrint, using the archaeological remains and environment to paint a grand, complex picture worthy of its millennia of history. It is illustrated with exceptional paintings by Grand Tourists like Edward Lear, the magnificent photographs of Luigi Ugolini, the recently discovered archives of the Communist period, and the Butrint Foundation's rich documentation. The book concludes by analysing how tourists are bringing economic hope to Albania as they dicsover the myth of Aeneas in its unspoilt landscape.