Street Celebration of New Year’s Eve in Belgrade Cover Image

Улична прослава Нове године у Београду
Street Celebration of New Year’s Eve in Belgrade

Author(s): Ivan Đorđević
Subject(s): Politics / Political Sciences, Customs / Folklore, Cultural Anthropology / Ethnology, Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), Identity of Collectives
Published by: Етнографски институт САНУ
Keywords: New Year’s Eve; street; reception; musical show; politics; identity construction; ritualism; political identity; fluctuating versus fixed identity;

Summary/Abstract: The New Year’s Eve celebration, held on the streets of Belgrade on the night of December 31st 2003 and January 1st 2004, represents a multilevel event. The celebration has a number of socio-cultural meanings readable through different frameworks: political, economic and ritual, the latter being maybe the most expressive one. In fact, the celebration of New Year’s Eve on the streets could be seen as reminiscent of gatherings of a similar type held against Milosevic’s government during his regime in the 1990’s. The celebration of New Year, 2004, did not have such an explicit political character; nevertheless, it was suppose to establish certain social values once held and proclaimed by the organizers of the political rallies against Milosevic. The social values and attitudes were embodied in street rallies, including the New Year’s Eve celebrations. This paper examines the political aspect of the New Year’s Eve celebration, with the special emphasis on identity construction, that is, on how and why the participation in the celebration implies certain identity pursuits.

  • Issue Year: LII/2004
  • Issue No: 1
  • Page Range: 81-90
  • Page Count: 10
  • Language: Serbian