Peter’s Blog

I think the break-up of Yugoslavia was traumatic on a level that most of us on the outside just don’t understand. While the direct warfare and killing was horrible, I get the sense that there was also weighty psychic trauma, as the society was ripped apart in a sort of fratricidal maelstrom. With this mental anguish, some now look back on Yugoslavia as a sort utopian society. Of course, whatever its merits (and there were some, especially compared to its replacement), Yugoslavian society was not perfect.

I mention this because my friend Adriana said this last night that she was Yugoslavian. But that country hasn’t existed whole for almost two decades! “But where in Yugoslavia?” someone pushed. Well, a bit of everywhere as it turns out: born in Sarajevo, lived in Belgrade, spent summers in (what is now) Croatia. And she’s not the first: Zoran, my tow truck driver in Portland (long story!), also proudly told me that he was Yugoslavian. I didn’t push for details.

The question then is, what happens when the country you identify with doesn’t exist any more? There are no easy answers, but if war is a force that gives us meaning, it is also a force which can destroy all identity.

Tags: identity, meaning, Society, war, Yugoslavia, Zoran

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 3rd, 2007 at 4:38 pm and is filed under Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.