Paper Short Abstract:

The paper analyzes a series of texts on folk life published at the beginning of the 20th century. It demonstrates how, during the formation of new nations, perceptions of "the Others" are constructed—whether referring to groups outside the community (the urban population) or those within it (such as Roma, the poor, criminals, prostitutes, etc.).

Paper Abstract:

Antun Radić, often referred to as the first Croatian ethnologist, initiated a large-scale project in 1897 under the auspices of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts to collect materials on folk life. The goal was to gather and publish as much material as possible over the coming decades about the culture of Croatian peasantry, which was seen as the foundation for building the future Croatian nation. At the time, 92% of Croatia's population consisted of peasants, and Radić pointed out the "problem" of a small bourgeoisie, which was largely composed of foreigners—namely Germans, Jews, Czechs, Hungarians, and Italians. He accused them of being heirs to an "alien" culture and aimed to use his project to highlight the values of the true, indigenous culture represented by the peasantry rather than the urban bourgeoisie. Furthermore, within the peasantry itself, Radić identified groups that did not fit the idealized image of the Croatian peasant. As a result, he sought to collect materials on Roma, folk healers, the poor, servants, beggars, criminals, drunkards, prostitutes, converts, and even the physically and mentally ill. In this presentation, my goal is to demonstrate how the published texts produced within Radić's project reveal the formation of the "Other" from the cultural perspective of the rural community. Whether referring to groups outside the community or those within it, I aim to show that the synthesis of the "Other"—and therefore the marginal from one's own perspective—is essential for the synthesis and centralization of one's own identity.