PRECARIOUS EXISTENCE UNDER REPRESSION IN 1990s KOSOVO: A CASE STUDY OF AN ALBANIAN ARCHIVIST.
This study explores the precarious life of Albanians in Kosovo during the 1990s through the oral autobiographical narrative of a retired archivist at the Institute of Albanology in Prishtina. With four decades of institutional experience, the archivist offers a compelling personal narrative of cultu...
| Publicado en: | Croatian Journal of Ethnology & Folklore Research / Narodna Umjetnost Vol. 63; no. 1; pp. 145 - 162 |
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| Formato: | Artículo |
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Institute of Ethnology & Folklore Research
2026
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| Sumario: | This study explores the precarious life of Albanians in Kosovo during the 1990s through the oral autobiographical narrative of a retired archivist at the Institute of Albanology in Prishtina. With four decades of institutional experience, the archivist offers a compelling personal narrative of cultural survival under systemic repression. The Institute, founded in 1953, became a target during the violent escalation of Serbian state control, culminating in the forced expulsion of its scientific staff in the early 1990s. This act not only displaced individuals, it also disrupted the scholarly continuity of one of Kosovo's key scientific and cultural institutions. The archivist's testimony captures this rupture while illuminating the broader landscape of institutional violence and state-sponsored erasure faced by Albanians in Kosovo. Her narrative highlights how intellectual communities responded by forming parallel academic structures sustaining scientific and cultural life. The study uses this oral history, an archive in itself, to interrogate the role of personal narrative in documenting institutional memory and reconstructing Kosovo's fraught historical landscape. By bringing her micro-narrative into dialogue with written sources, this work reflects on the violence, resilience, and fragility of life under occupation, while raising questions about memory, resistance, and the ongoing process of state-building in post-war Kosovo. U članku se istražuje nesiguran život Albanaca na Kosovu tijekom 1990-ih kroz usmenu autobiografsku priču umirovljene arhivistice koja je radila u Institutu za albanologiju u Prištini. S četiri desetljeća institucionalnog iskustva, arhivistica nudi uvjerljivo osobno svjedočanstvo o kulturnom preživljavanju pod sistemskom represijom. Institut, osnovan 1953. godine, bio je na meti političkih napada tijekom nasilne eskalacije srbijanske državne kontrole, što je kulminiralo prisilnim protjerivanjem znanstvenog osoblja početkom 1990-ih. To je dovelo do raseljavanja pojedinaca te poremetilo kontinuitet jedne od ključnih znanstvenih i kulturnih institucija na Kosovu. Svjedočanstvo arhivistice obuhvaća taj prekid, a istodobno rasvjetljava širi kontekst institucionalnog nasilja i brisanja pod pokroviteljstvom države s kojim su se suočavali Albanci na Kosovu. Njezin narativ ističe reakciju intelektualnih zajednica koje su formirale paralelne akademske strukture radi održavanja znanstvenog i kulturnog života. Na temelju ove usmene povijesti, koja je sama po sebi arhiva, u radu se propituje uloga osobnog narativa u dokumentiranju institucionalnog pamćenja i rekonstrukciji bremenitog povijesnog krajolika Kosova. U radu se mikronaracija supostavlja pisanim izvorima, na temelju čega se promišlja o nasilju, otpornosti i krhkosti života pod okupacijom, uz istodobno bavljenje pitanjima sjećanja, otpora te još uvijek aktivnog procesa izgradnje države u poslijeratnom Kosovu. |
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