Tomasz KAMUSELLA ALBANIA
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View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by St Andrews Research Repository 96 E-ISSN 2537–6152 REVISTA DE ETNOLOGIE ŞI CULTUROLOGIE Chișinău, 2016 Volumul XX Tomasz KAMUSELLA ALBANIA: A DENIAL OF THE OTTOMAN PAST (SCHOOL TEXTBOOKS AND POLITICS OF MEMORY)1 Rezumat Summary Albania: negarea trecutului otoman (manualele Albania: A Denial of the Ottoman past (School şcolare şi politicile de conservare a memoriei) textbooks and politics of memory) În şcolile din Albania postcomunistă, pe lângă ma- In post-communist Albania’s schools, alongside reg- nualele destinate pentru predarea istoriei, de asemenea, în ular textbooks of history for teaching the subject, school calitate de material didactic suplimentar sunt utilizate şi atlases of history are also employed as a prescribed or atlasele şcolare. Faptele şi relatările istorice ale trecutului adjunct textbook. In the stories and facts related through otoman, menţionate atât prin texte cât şi prin hărţi, sunt in- texts and maps, the Ottoman past is curiously warped discret denaturate şi marginalizate. Ca rezultat, în prezent, and marginalized. As a result, the average Albanian is left cetăţeanul albanez este incapabil să explice de ce în Albania, incapable of explaining why Albania is a predominantly unde predomină un sistem de guvernământ musulman, în Muslim polity, but with a considerable degree of tolerant acelaşi timp persistă un grad considerabil de toleranţă poli- poly-confessionalism. Furthermore, school history educa- confesionalistă. Cu toate acestea, curricula şcolară albaneză tion in Albania propagates the unreflective anti-Ottoman la disciplina „Istorie” continuă să propage în mod denaturat feeling encapsulated by the stereotypes of ‘Turkish yoke’ sentimentul antiotoman încapsulat de stereotipurile „jugul or ‘the five centuries of Turkish occupation.’ This simplis- turcesc” sau „cinci secole de ocupaţie turcească”. Acest „an- tic anti-Ottomanism of Albanian culture and public dis- tiosmanism” implantat în cultura şi discursul public alba- course is strangely at variance with the Muslim and poly- nez a devenit un „corp străin” pentru statul albanez, care confessional character of Albania. are un caracter musulman şi policonfesnional. Key words: Albania, anti-Ottomanism, dhimmi, pol- Cuvinte-cheie: Albania, „antiosmanism”, dhimmi, itics of memory, school atlases of history, school history politici de conservare a memoriei, atlase şcolare la discipli- education, school history textbooks. na „Istorie”, curricula şcolară la disciplina „Istorie”, manua- le şcolare la disciplina „Istorie”. During my trips abroad, I developed a curious cus- tom of purchasing history textbooks used in a given coun- Резюме try’s schools. I also checked on the existence of a history at- Албания: отрицание османского наследия (школь- las as a genre of regular or adjunct textbook. Colleagues of ные учебники и политики сохранения памяти) mine were flabbergasted, because sojourns abroad should be more fun than going back to some fusty classroom, В школах посткоммунистической Албании, наря- even notionally. However, taxi drivers, shop assistants, café ду с учебниками по истории, в качестве дополнитель- owners, professors, and local travelers whom I meet in the ного дидактического материала также используются и country of my visit had to learn from exactly such text- школьные атласы. Изложение информации об исто- books and atlases of history. In the course of their compul- рических событиях османского прошлого, как упо- sory education, a certain image of their own nation-state минаемых в текстах, так и представленных в картах, and of the outside world in relation to it was firmly placed явно искажено и маргинализировано. Как следствие, in their heads. Now, for better or worse, as adults, they ob- в настоящее время албанский гражданин не спосо- serve reality through the prism of these early school images бен объяснить, почему в Албании, с преобладанием (or rather, stereotypes) that are implanted in their minds, системы мусульманского правления, в то же время в solidified, and came to constitute ‘the truth’, the national значительной степени сохраняется толерантность к dogma, an ideological yardstick, against which events in поликонфессиональности. Вместе с тем, албанский their own nation-state and abroad must be assessed2. школьный куррикулум по дисциплине «История», It is next to impossible to take off these nationally- искажая реальность, продолжает пропагандировать tinted spectacles, because hardly anyone notices their ex- антиосманские чувства, овеянные стереотипами «ту- istence in the first place. The ‘textbook truth’ about ‘our рецкое иго» или «пять веков турецкой оккупации». Та- nation’ and the wider world becomes naturalized3. Rarely кой «антиосманизм», внедренный в культуру и обще- are we jostled out from this easy complacency, most often ственный дискурс Албании, стал «инородным телом» when we talk about exactly the same events from the past для албанского государства, носящего мусульманский to people who received their education in another country. и поликонфессиональный характер. We are as much surprised about their ‘incorrect’ interpre- Ключевые слова: Албания, «антиосманизм», tation of these events as they about ours. We may take of- дхимми, политики сохранения памяти, школьные ат- fense or decide to avoid the touchy subject for the sake of ласы, школьный куррикулум по дисциплине «Исто- politeness. As a result, these invisible spectacles continue рия», школьные учебники по дисциплине «История». to sit on our nose and distort reality in the nationally-in- E-ISSN 2537–6152 THE JOURNAL OF ETHNOLOGY AND CULTUROLOGY Chisinau, 2016 Volume XX 97 flected manner, as intended by our country’s ministry of tween lectures and other official engagements, I persisted education, in line with the national curriculum that has to and enquired young kids about these school atlases. They be followed by all schools across our homeland. confirmed my hunch that such atlases do exist. It appears A lot of disagreements and misunderstandings among that the National Library either does not collect them, or people coming from different countries – be them personal has a cataloging backlog in this field that goes back to the or at the level of politics and scholarship – have their source early 1990s. It may not be that surprising, when one bears in national-skewed school education [67]. In earlier ages, in mind the fact that in 1997 all structures of the post- prior to the rise of the ideal of free and compulsory edu- communist Albanian state collapsed, the economy suf- cation for all, religions tended to put stereotypes in chil- fered a complete meltdown and the civil war ensued [52]. dren’s heads. Nowadays, when we are awash with veritable Tirana’s Mediterranean climate and the compact pet bytes of textual and audiovisual information available shape of its center makes the city friendly to flaneurs, de- online, the ‘correct and advisable’ trajectory of national spite the heavy traffic, the almost non-existence of pave- thinking about the past and the present is set out in the ments, uneven street surfaces and missing manhole cov- state’s officially managed Geschichtspolitik (politics of his- ers. I developed a voracious taste for walks that brought me tory, politics of memory). With lavish governmental sup- to all sorts of neighborhoods and half-concealed corners, port, ‘promising’ research projects are pursued, ‘appropri- including some local bookstores unknown to tourists. I ate’ books are published in steep runs, films on ‘glorious also discovered that, like in Turkey, school textbooks can national stories’ are produced, and ‘nationally correct’ con- be more readily found in stationery shops than in regular tent is copiously generated for websites. This swelling wave bookstores. The persistence paid off. I managed to buy sev- of ‘correct thinking’ about the past drowns out other views en school atlases of history published in the 21st century. and interpretations, pushing them under rubrics marked Two of these atlases are adaptations and partial trans- as ‘unreliable’, ‘eccentric’, ‘wrong’, or outright ‘lunatic’ [84]. lations from the German and Italian originals [9]. All of In this way, facts and events, which do not fit into the ap- them cover world history, with the exception of a single proved national master narrative, are brushed away from atlas solely devoted to the Albanian national master nar- the public purview, downgraded to the status of ‘informa- rative [81]. One of the atlases was published in Macedonia tion noise’, which every ‘appropriately’ educated citizen and is also distributed in Albania and Kosovo [16], while is conditioned to reject on the first reading or watching, another appeared in Tirana, but it is sold in Kosovo and deeming them as ‘incorrect’ by default. The erstwhile dis- Macedonia, as well [33]. Most of these atlases are ear- cussion between different points of view is replaced by marked for the subsequent school grades, namely, 4th, [60], the brutal duel fought through the exponentially growing 7th [54], and 8th [55; 81]. volume of ‘appropriate information’, ever faster and more The Albanian-language general atlases of world his- broadly disseminated. It is eerily close to cyber war [26]. tory, with the predictable focus on Europe, features either That national story wins what is repeated more frequently special thematic sections or single maps devoted to Alba- and imparted with the use of more ubiquitous and intru- nian history