Orientalist Ethnonationalism: From Irredentism to Independentism. Discourse analysis of the Albanian ethnonationalist narrative about the National Rebirth (1870-1930) and Kosovo Independence (1980-2000)

Gorani, Dukagjin 2011. Orientalist Ethnonationalism: From Irredentism to Independentism. Discourse analysis of the Albanian ethnonationalist narrative about the National Rebirth (1870-1930) and Kosovo Independence (1980-2000). PhD Thesis, Cardiff University. Item availability restricted.

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Abstract

The thesis focuses on the chronological identification and detection of the discursive analogies between the category of 'the nation‘ and those of 'the West‘, 'Europe‘, 'democracy‘ and 'independence‘ in the Kosovo Albanian ethnonationalist narrative. The study represents a multi-dimensional exercise analysing the ethnonationalist discourse from a wide array of sample text which was produced during two relevant historical periods: the period between 1870-1930 and the period between 1980-2000. The first interval covers the period which is known in the Albanian history as the 'National Rebirth‘. The second deals with the recent history of political resistance of Kosovo Albanians and their 'sudden‘ discursive shift, from the narrative of 'unification with the Motherland Albania‘ (the unification'st/irredentist discourse) to the narrative of 'the independent Kosovo‘ (the independentist discourse) The main theoretical pillars of the study focus on the theories about the nation (specifically, its ethnic variation) and its narrative, the nationalism—as well as the representational systems of orientalism and balkanism (Said, 1978; Todorova, 1997). The study demonstrates that the discourse about the nation and national identity among Albanians is produced primarily through the internalisation of the external, orientalist approach in defining and understanding the social reality of the Balkan societies. Such internalisation is analysed through the prism of local adoption of the sociocultural and sociopolitical hegemonizing discourse that constituted the Western orientalist 'knowledge‘ about the Balkans—and, specifically, Albanians. (The study notes that such discursive strategy of internalisation of orientalist traits within the ethnonationalist narrative is not limited to the Albanian societies (in both Albania and Kosovo) but appears as common feature in most of the societies/nations of the former Yugoslavia. In time, the study highlights, such process of 'nesting orientalisms‘ (Bakic-Hayden, 1996) was coupled with the phenomenon of the regional, exclusionist and competing ethnonationalist narratives which was aimed at constituing a nation‘s 'westernness‘ and 'Europeanness‘ through denying it to the other.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Status:	Unpublished
Schools:	Journalism, Media and Culture
Subjects:	D History General and Old World > D History (General) D History General and Old World > DR Balkan Peninsula
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	30 March 2016
Last Modified:	19 Mar 2016 22:41
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/24085

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