Саморефлексии на журналистите за цензура и натиск в медиите, които напускат

Author(s): Zhana Popova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2022

The text presents results of research on how journalists tell about censorship and pres-sure on their work in the media. A number of studies point to major problems such as corporate pressure on journalists in private media; tabooization of certain topics by public and state-owned media, but also distortion of the information picture due to commercial interests. One very specific biographical moment, i.e. the quitting, dismis-sal or discharge of journalists from the media, has been chosen as a focus of the study of journalistic perceptions of limitations on the professional field. The study answers the questions: When do journalists think they were free in the media? How do they describe their perceptions of freedom of expression? How do they construct their personal narratives in media interviews in the period after quitting or being banished from the media?

Тайната страна на предизвикателството „Нобел“ –архиви, тайни общества, публичност (България, 1910–1945 г.)

Author(s): Elena Azmanova-Rudarska / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2022

The prestigious world award has existed for more than 120 years, but there is still no Bulgarian winner. This report presents part of a study on this issue. Focusing on the personalities proposed until 1945 – Andrey Lyapchev, Pencho Slaveykov, Ivan Vazov, Ivan Grozev and Elisaveta Bagryana, the study traces the choice, motives and support they receive from the Bulgarian side. Presenting unknown facts from the archives, the report sheds light on another secret side – the intervention of secret societies in Bulgaria behind the candidacies and the formation of a lobby for the prestigious award. At the same time, public opinions, statements and statements that coincide with or differ from the actual facts are presented. For this purpose, examples from the pages of the Bulgarian and French press are attracted, as well as letters, memoirs and testimonies about the time.

Building a Part of Nation Abroad (How Civitas Dei Voyvodovo become a Czech Village in Bulgaria)

Author(s): Marek Jakoubek / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2022

Voyvodovo, a village in Northwest Bulgaria, is standardly described as a Czech village in Bulgaria, inhabited by the Czech compatriots. The article tries to prove this conceptualization historically inadequate and offers a different line of interpretation. It shows that members of this community, who had left Czech lands before the Czech national revival movement, did not share Czech national identity because this was established only after their departure. Instead of being a Czech village, Voyvodovo community was nationally indifferent. The main element of collective identity of its members was religion, which represented the central organizing principle of the community. Czechs become Voyvodovans only much later, due to the outside influence of the socalled “fellow-countryman care” executed upon them by the Czechoslovak Republic in the interwar period.

Историята на литературата като минно поле: „Взривена литература“

Author(s): Milena Angelova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 3/2022

This article is a review of the study entitled Взривена литература. Военни прози, партизански разкази, партийни мемоари [Explosive Literature: Military Predictions, Partisan Narratives, Party Memoirs], authored by Maya Angelova.

От утопия до бутафория: движението "Героят е винаги в строя" в комунистическа България (1970-те – 1980-те г.)

Author(s): Milena Angelova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 1/2023

The so-called „patronage movement“„The Hero is always in our lines” was designed as a state initiative in the 1970s. It was part of the ideological scenarios of the late communism illustrating the attempts for establishment of state control over the cultur-al memory in a radical manner. The Bulgarian version of „The Hero is always in our lines” was a response to the similar Soviet model „For That Lad” (Za togo parnia). The basic idea of the campaign was that a team of workers had to choose fallen com-munist „heroes as their „patrons” in order to sustain their memory. The heroes were enlisted in the payroll and work brigades fulfilled additional work assignment on their behalf and received their wages.

Привилегировани агенти vs репресирани „шпиони“

Author(s): Maria Pileva,Angel Pilev / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2023

The paper examines the problems faced by evangelical ministers condemned in the so-called Pastoral Trials (1948–1985) and their families. At the same time, the Bulgarian State Security managed to launch its own cadres to take the places of uncomfortable ones on the pulpits and push state policy following the KGB models. And they suc-ceeded in converting even some of the pastors who have been caught up in the judicial processes and declared unjustly. Attention is paid to the instigated opposition against highly educated and erudite clergymen enjoying authority in society, by officials obe-dient to the new authority, ready to sell their faith for some silver coin.

Branded Identities. Remarks on the Holocaust chapter of the Macedonian-Bulgarian War on Identity

Author(s): Péter Krasztev / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

The paper approaches the issue of the Holocaust in South-Eastern Europe from the perspective of country branding and „competing identities” – term coined by Simon Anholt in the first decade of the 21st century. Though examination of the official North Macedonian and Bulgarian discourses about the WWII reflected in the contem-porary films, serials, political and historical statements, quasi-academic pamphlets, and partly architecture, the study aims to explore the mechanisms of construction of a new, “Holocaust-based” historical identity in these countries. The study argues that the current politics of memory of the two sides is propagandistic and mostly based on PR technologies which are rather indifferent or only partly sensitive to the historical facts and moral/humanist aspects of the question. The conclusion therefore is that the construction of a "competitive identity" by both sides was doomed to failure because countries that cannot achieve a minimum internal consensus on basic human, legal, aesthetic, political, etc. norms and values – as Anholt's concept would require -, have no chance of presenting an outwardly attractive, or at least acceptable, image.

Fate of Scientists and Artists in the Period of the Red and Big Terror

Author(s): Marine Aroshidze,Nino Aroshidze / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

Whatever is the nature of the war there are two parties engaged in conflict. Terror is much more terrible, because in this case there are no opposing sides: the “powers that be” methodically destroy “undesirable elements”. In Georgia, the intelligentsia was gradually eliminated: writers, poets, scientists, public figures were sent to camps, shot, evicted by families, forced to write false denunciations. Thus, analyzing the develop-ment of science and culture in Georgia between the two world wars, we can conclude that the Sovietization of Georgia and the regime of "great terror" were characterized by such a large number of victims among the Georgian intelligentsia and talented youth that the problems of science were relegated to the urgent need survive.

From Being Deprived to Bestowing Privileges – Artistic Reflections of the Wrestlers /Mutri/ Subculture in The Novels by Georgi Stoev

Author(s): Nina Debruyne / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2023

One of the most characteristic phenomena of the Transition in Bulgaria in the 1990s were the socalled Wrestlers’ brigades. Their emergence and rise left a lasting imprint on the social fabric and provided the initial impetus for the formation of the so-called ‘Wrestlers/ Mutri’ subculture. In a situation of rapidly changing public, economic and social environments in Bulgaria after the fall of the totalitarian regime in 1989, the Wrestlers’ brigades gave young men with modest family backgrounds the opportunity to become part of a set enjoying a progressively privileged economic and social circumstance. In the aftermath of the state's abdication of its regulatory and adjudicative functions, these groups and their individual members gained access to various power levers and transformed from privileged to privileging — granting privileges — both to in-group members (family, friends, etc.) and outsiders such as politicians, business people, artists, etc. This process of transformation from disadvantaged to privileged in this context has not yet been fully explored. The available documentary and archival information is currently limited and difficult to access. Fiction as a parallel source allows us to consider these processes from a different angle. The purpose of the proposed paper is to analyse the novels of Georgi Stoev – admittedly a former member of a Wrestler’s group, as a source of information about the process of transformation from disadvantage to privilege and of specific subcultural traits. By comparing the information in the eight books in the ‘Witnesses of the Times’ and ‘BG Godfather’ series with publicly available documents, studies and publications, a deeper understanding is obtained of the values and dynamics of the Wrestlers/ Mutri subculture in Bulgaria at the end of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st century.

Yugoslav Totalitarian Society, Discrimination Against Albanian and Bulgarian Minorities in Macedonia

Author(s): Arsim Sinani,Veli KRYEZIU / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2023

The Balkans as a region of Southeast Europe is one of the most sensitive regions of Europe; this is where the sparks of war arose from the time of the Ottoman Empire until 2001 when a political solution was finally given to each problem of nationalities and inequalities in this region. The former Yugoslavia as an artificial creation of a state, lacking nationality, is one of the sources of conflicts which erupted with bloody wars caused by Serbia. The Yugoslav federation which gained political power after World War II consisted of 6 republics and 2 provinces. According to the Federal Constitution of Yugoslavia, all peoples must be integrated into Yugoslavia. Unfortunately within Yugoslavia there were privileged peoples, and others who were treated as secondary-class people. Albanians in Yugoslavia, most of whom belonged to the Autonomous Province of Kosovo, did not experience the status of equal population in Yugoslavia; Bulgarians were treated the same, most of whom lived in the Socialist Republic of Macedonia. The Republican government in Macedonia influenced by the Federal one has directly influenced Macedonia in the manner of discrimination against national minorities such as Albanians, Bulgarians, Hungarians, Roma, Ashkali, Turks, etc., while the: Serbian, Montenegrin, Macedonian people have been the most privileged ones within the Republic, as well as in the Yugoslav Federation.The communist regime in Yugoslavia denied any minority efforts for equality and prosperity. The most vocal in the quest for rights were Albanians and Bulgarians, who faced torture, draconian punishments, internment, and even murder in Yugoslav concentration camps. Yugoslavia, namely the Socialist Republic of Macedonia from 1945 until 2001, was the most dictatorial regime in the history of Southeast Europe for Albanians and Bulgarians; unfortunately the Bulgarian community in Macedonia, even with the new constitution, has not resolved its political, cultural, educational status etc…

Маргиналният Друг в постсъветското пространство (Наблюдения върху полския литературен репортаж за Изтока)

Author(s): Kristiyan Yanev / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 3/2023

The paper analyzes Polish literary reportage as a trend evolved from a rather marginalized position of a hybrid genre to a prized form of literary expression in the last decades. More often than not, the genre’s main focus in the unprivileged, problematic or unknown marginal Other, which is visible in the journalistic fiction about Poland’s eastern neighbors. At the same time, the imagining of the Other can be problematic and biased, which is a major concern for the authors, whose position between the belletristic and the journalistic poses different demands on the texts about Russia. The major political, cultural and economic post-1989 transformation in the countries of the former USSR occupy a privileged place among the topics of the genre. The text compares the representation of post-Soviet reality in the literary reportages of Ryszard Kapuściński, Jacek Hugo-Bader and Jędrzej Morawiecki, focussing on the depiction of the marginalized groups in the postcommunist society. The texts argues that each decade after the Soviet Union’s collapse brings forth a different type of marginalization (ethnic and political in the 1990s; social and cultural in the 2000s; religious and ideological in the 2010s).

Първи стъпки към смяната на имената (Рибново, 1953 г.)

Author(s): Nurie Muratova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 1/2024

Passportization of the Pomak population in the village of Ribnovo in 1953 has a violent character particularly visible in two directions: the im-position of compulsory, Bulgarian ethnicity and restriction of the right to free religion.Changing the passports of the Pomaks was resisted because they opposed their enrollment as "Bulgarians" without mentioning their differ-ent region, and against the photographing of women. One of the first villages was Ribnovo, where resistance to the introduction of new per-sonal documents began. In the following years, this village became the center of the resistance against the communist authorities in their attempt to change the Turkish names of Pomaks (1964). The very act of passportization in the Pomaks can be seen as a prelude to the later change of their names to Bulgarian names.

„Атеизмологията“ или Абсурдът като нормалност

Author(s): Evgenia Ivanova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 1/2024

According to the author's point of view, atheist politics, expressed not only as secular-ization and profanation of religious objects and practices, but also as organized pog-roms on them, is a vivid manifestation of the totalitarian regime, not – an accidental perversion of an otherwise "normal" system. The only thing that seems "normal" (be-cause it is characteristic of the totalitarian state in principle) in this policy is the sys-tematic absurdity with invention of traditions, ritual practices and whole sciences such as atheismology and atheology.

Cultural and Linguistic Specifics of a 19th Century Manuscript from the National Library “Ivan Vazov” in Plovdiv

Author(s): Hristo Saldzhiev / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2024

The present article explores a short Bulgarian manuscript preserved in the National Library “Ivan Vazov”. It dates back to the early 1830s and contains 12 pages. Eleven of them are written in Turkish with Cyrillic script and includes over 100 Turkish prov-erbs. The last 12th page contains a marginal note that is written in Bulgarian. The manuscript precedes the appearance of the first editions of printed books in Turkish with Cyrillic script in the early 1840s and is one of the earliest written representations of 19th century Bulgarian-Turkish bilingualism. Several problems are addressed in the article – the authorship and exact date of the manuscript, the specifics of the lan-guage, structure and content of proverbs.

Women owning Property in mid-19th Century Serbia

Author(s): Siegfried Gruber,Daniel-Armin Đumić / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2024

The Serbian census of 1862/63 includes information about the property and income of the census population. Most property was owned by men, but a minority of women had some possession of their own. Most of them were either heirs of their husband or their father. This paper will take a closer look at these propertied women and the characteristics of them and their property.

Цар Фердинанд в Словакия: през погледа на историческите факти и художествената литература

Author(s): Maria Dobrikova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2024

Комунистическият генерал Мирчо Спасов и възшествието на беззаконието. Психоанализа, език и история

Author(s): Petar Vodenicharov / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2024

Using the linguistic turn in psychoanalysis (J. Lakan, J. Kristeva), the author analyzed the unpublished autobiographical memories of State Security General Mircho Spasov, a mass murderer responsible for the eitsblishing of communist concentration camps. His memories are compared with his personnel file in the State Security. The lack of a father, the suicidal mother who abandoned him, the alienation from kinship, religious and institutional symbolic networks lead to a rethinking of the punishing in a rewarding social situation with the help of communist anti-language, conspiratorial publicity and the grandiose utopia for an all-powerful, self-sufficient, phallic "Mother Communist Party". Sado-masochic pre-Oedipal regression is associated with early narcissistic trauma and the problem of the Other – eroticizing the power over Others and the power of the Others. The analysis is supported by the similar biographical profiles of the Head of State Todor Zhivkov, a friend of Mircho Spasov, and his col-league from the State Security – the terrorist Mitka Grubcheva.

„Неблагонадеждни“ истории – архивен прочит на досиета на „опозиционни“ служители в ДП „Българска кинематография“ в периода 1948–1958

Author(s): Irina Kitova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2024

The political change that occurred in Bulgaria in the middle of the 20th century had a serious impact on administrative practices for personnel selection in various professional fields. In culture and the arts, it becomes especially important to attract people with appropriate political views and behavior corresponding to the imposed party criteria, goals and values. At the same time, the totalitarian machine worked mercilessly against any form of difference, whether it is a matter of lifestyle, character traits or simple expression of disagreement. Diverse information is duly collected for anyone who starts work in important spheres for the new government, such as cinema. By studying the personnel files of candidates for certain positions or employees who are inconvenient to the authorities, trends can be discovered in the way personnel are selected in the Bulgarian cinematography. This would allow for inferences to be made about the practices of enforcing the new political doctrine on the 'cultural front' by minimizing or eliminating opportunities for divergent thinking, individualism, innovation or cultural pluralism. The effects of this ideological and cultural recoding have a tangible impact on entire cultural and professional fields, but also on the development of cultural industries in Bulgaria and their ability to adapt to subsequent changes. Мoreover, studying and rationalizing the past could help us make visible causality obscured by historical time in order to find more effective solutions to some problems of the present.

Образът на патриота и на врага на народа в избрани документи от архива на ДС

Author(s): Nadezhda Stalyanova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2024

The paper explores the linguistic devices and strategies used by State Security collab-orators to characterize the personalities and actions of targets of operational interest. On the one hand, the text examines documents from the State Security archives (re-cruitment offers and recruitment reports) that describe the ways in which new collabo-rators were recruited. On the other, the descriptions of the subjects of the reports in the reports are of interest. The research focuses on the communicative language pat-terns used and described in the relevant documents. As a source of excerpted material for scientific analysis, we used the book "Pastors Agents of the State Security Service" by Angel Pilev. Through an applied combination of research methods - lexical-semantic and discourse analysis, we search for lexical means with connotative load, as well as characterizing lexemes, building the opposite images - of the patriot informer and the enemy of the people reasons. By applying the close reading method, we aim at explicating the reader's point of view with minimal historical context. The linguistic material shows that the documents of the State Security build a very negative image of the enemy of the people. The strategy of the recruiters is also analyzed, emphasizing patriotic feelings, patriotic duty, expression of love for the motherland, and the noble deed to be done by the agents. The text emphasizes that it is to linguistics, along with other humanities that expectations are addressed for an objective, publicly accessible, and convincing interpretation of the era of socialism.

Национализмът – наследство или новина?

Author(s): Evgenia Ivanova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 2/2024

The text is based on several empirical studies dealing with the question – whether the current nationalism in Bulgaria (compared to other Balkan countries) is inherited from previous periods, i.e. – whether it is "immanently inherent" to the Bulgarian nation, or whether it is the result of specific conjunctures and is activated on specific occasions. The question is also examined – whether the motivation for nationalist mobilization is always due to "innate" or "inherited" nationalism, or whether it can be different – social, economic, political, seen as "purely" nationalist.