Paper short abstract:

In the Serbian language, between the words "modern" and "European" an equality sign can be put. Both words suggests "progress," "civility", "contemporariness" ... In this regard, European values are understood as the values of modern civilization and local heritage is often used as a token of these values.

Paper long abstract:

By presenting local and national heritage as part of the European tradition, Serbia is included in the projects of symbolical European integration. However, traces of this identification should not be sought only in the official, diplomatic or bureaucratic level.

In this context, the paper will analyze a contemporary commercial advertisement produced for the Serbian market. This is a commercial that promotes the manufacturer of potato chips. The hero of advertisement is a modern young man who enjoys industrially produced chips, but made according the recipe of his grandparents. Name of advertisements is: "Grandpa's breed - Grandma's gold", which applies to the both, the young man and the chips.

The advertisement repeats frequent recipe used also in bureaucratic communication: through individual, local and national, to common, European and contemporary. But the catch is in - a potato. Potatoes became a customary food in Serbia not before the mid-nineteenth century. In this sense, it is a very "young" tradition and it is specifically linked to European influence. Thus, on the one hand, the advertisement clearly illustrates the use of the mechanism of transition from traditional to modern. But on the other hand, clearly indicates the common heritage of European modern age, to which Serbia also belongs.