Identiteti, antizapadnjaštvo i antiamerikanizam u kulturi srpskog društva / Identities, Anti-westernism and Anti-americanism in the Culture of Serbian Society

Abstract

The author of this paper puts forward, and attempts to prove, the hypothesis that anti-Westernism and anti-Americanism are firmly embedded in the lifestyle of an “average” Serb and that it is very difficult to extract them from their identity. The periods of Serbian cultural history related to the change in identity and the “anti-American” lifestyle are provisionally called presocialist, socialist and postsocialist in this paper, and in each of them the author searches for crucial reasons (causes and effects) behind the anti-Western and anti-American sentiment. It is paradoxical that this state has not changed for more than two centuries now, not even during those times when the awareness of its harmfulness to the interests of one’s society and culture was present. Such attitudes have not sprung forth from the people themselves but have by rule been constructed in the circles of the governing Serbian elites and have been used as a political means of manipulation, all with the aim of acquiring or extending power. Using a primarily sociological method, the author scrutinizes the culture of Serbia retrospectively, so as to show how little has changed in the sense of the construction of identities in this long historical period. Today, in the era of postmodern culture, Serbia remains in the state of premodernity – identities are in crisis since they are still predominantly perceived as static and strictly determined, and not plural, fluid and fragmentary.