Bulgarians: We or the Others? (Self-)identification of Paulicians from Banat Cover Image

Болгары – это мы или другие? (Само)идентификация павликан из Баната
Bulgarians: We or the Others? (Self-)identification of Paulicians from Banat

Author(s): Marija Vučković
Subject(s): Anthropology, Language studies, Applied Linguistics
Published by: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Marii Curie-Sklodowskiej
Keywords: self-identification; group identity; ethnonym; Paulicians; Banat Bulgarians

Summary/Abstract: This paper is based on the fieldwork conducted in the community of Paulicians on the territory of the West Banat (Serbia) by the researchers of the Institute for Balkan Studies (Belgrade) and the University of Sofia. The appellation used for this ethnic group varies in the scholarly literature: Bulgarians Roman-Catholics, Bulgarians Paulicians, the Banat-Bulgarians and палчене, палкене / Palćani, the ethnonym used by Paulicians alone in reference to themselves. The paper explores (self-)identification, be it individual or collective, in the discourse of one of the interlocutors. During the interviews done by the researchers from Serbia, the informant has referred to his community as Palćani (Paulicians) and Bugari (Bulgarians). On some occasions, nevertheless, he has called into question the latter as an affiliation option. Talking to the researchers from Bulgaria he has used these ethnonyms to express the I / we (palk’êne) : you (bъlgare) relation. This paper aims at tracing the factors which caused the informant’s statements on the adequacy of the self-identification as Bulgarian(s) to be inconsistent.

  • Issue Year: 20/2008
  • Issue No: 20
  • Page Range: 333-348
  • Page Count: 16
  • Language: Russian