Jargon der eigentlichen Geschichte: Vom Nichtverstehen und dem Fremden. Zur Diskussion um Holm Sundhaussens Geschichte Serbiens in der serbischen Öffe
Jargon of Real History: Of the Lack of Understanding and the Foreign. On the Debates over Holm Sundhaussen’s History of Serbia in the Serbian Public

Summary/Abstract: This text describes the reaction of historians in Serbia towards the latest publication by Holm Sundhaussen “History of Serbia”, which was recently translated into Serbian. The text begins with crucial reflections by Holm Sundhaussen about the relationship between history and memory. There Sundhaussen observes a difference between history as a science and memory, with its primary function to create sense within a (national) collective. The second part depicts currents within the Serbian historiography particularly against the background of the mentioned relationship towards history and memory. It becomes visible that one particular current within the Serbian historiography criticizes the book of Holm Sundhaussen. This current could be described by understanding history as the core of the national masternarrative. History in this understanding is in the first place national history. On the other hand, approaches that operate with the deconstruction of such narratives, qualified the book as an important contribution towards an understanding of Serbian history in the last two centuries. The second part of the text analyzes the connection between the experience of crisis and war in the 1990s and a possible legitimatizing function of a national master-narrative. It becomes clear in the concluding remarks, that the vigorous defense against the interpretation of the Serbian history by Holm Sundhaussen is also motivated by the gradual loss of the dominant position the protagonists maintained up to now within the Serbian historiography. Criticism is not directed exclusively against Sundhaussen´s book, but also against the representatives of a deconstructive approach within the Serbian historiography.

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