mersiowsky - 2-17-2018 at 12:57 PM
Lětopis Abstract 2017 2: Wutti, Daniel: Memory, Group Identity and Political Participation. The Slovenes of Carinthia between Cultural
Insecurity and Security
The indigenous Slovenian minority in Carinthia/Koroška, a federal state in the south of Austria, suffered decades of cultural insecurity, including
discrimination, assimilation and political exclusion. The Carinthian Slovenes responded by continuing to foster their cultural heritage within the
confines of their ethnic group and at the same time closed themselves off from the world outside their ethnic group (Volkan). In the meantime, more
than 70 years after the end of National Socialism and more than 40 years after the violent anti-Slovenian events, such as the attacks on bilingual
place names (“Ortstafelsturm“), the ethnic minority is confronted with the challenge of achieving a new, given the right circumstances, more inclusive
form of cultural security. It seems that young people will have to play an important role in this process. This text presents four forms of cultural
insecurity for the Carinthian Slovenes. The first chapter goes back into the past, specifically to the emergence of different "communities of shared
memory“ in Carinthia. Following this in the next chapter, psycho-traumatological attempts to explain the complex relationship, even today, are
presented, between the "minority“ and the "dominant social group“. A (sobering) analysis of the current possibilities for Carinthian Slovenes to
participate politically in Austria follows in the third chapter. The text concludes with reflections on the dynamic identity of young, present-day
members of the minority in the fourth chapter.