Karizmatična fauna u službi konstruiranja lokalnog identiteta
Charismatic Fauna in the Service of Constructing Local Identity

Summary/Abstract: Drawing on the basic premise that social actors are free of metaphysical predestination in shaping identity, but relatively closely determined by parameters of social-historical and natural contexts, the authors are examining the role of the so-called charismatic fauna (imposing animal species that mark a certain territory by their presence) in constructing local identities. In analysing the process of creating and articulating local culture (characterised and formed by a close connection with its immediate natural surroundings), especially fruitful is the bioregional perspective, which also enables a more complete understanding of the relationship between the animal and human community on a certain territory. The authors indicate that these relationships are, as a rule, ambivalent and dynamic – imbued with respect, but also conflicts, persecutions and truces, which is persuasively illustrated by examples from Norwegian and Slovak ethnic heritage as well as that of Croatia’s Lika region. The analysis of contemporary examples indicates that the identity image of the locality, based on imposing domicile animal species, as a rule, is constructed for the purpose of tourist industry promotion, and this has been illustrated by specific examples from Croatia ("the Istrian menagerie", the island of Lošinj and the dolphin; the island of Cres and the griffon vulture; the Lika bear). The authors also conclude that the contemporary man and woman, in accordance with lessons from the bioregional perspective, should, apart from making banal (financial) profit from these attempts, also gain a far greater inconsumable advantage – the raising awareness of one’s own (forgotten, but constitutive) naturalness and the inimitable commitments emanating from it.

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