A Haunted Nation: The Separation Of Tamils
By Rajan Hoole -November 15, 2013 |
Rajan Hoole
Sri Lanka: A Haunted Nation - The Social Underpinnings Of Communal Violence- Part 9
Ethnicity: The Futility Of Backward Projection
The case of Kosovo in the (former) Yugo- slavia illustrates the absurdity of, and the violent passions engendered by, attempts to project backwards the ethnic composition prevalent at a given time. The Albanians were one of the area’s older indigenous groups. Slavs from the north did not expand into the region until the 9th century AD. Serbs, a Slav group, did not become significant there until the late 12th century when the Serbian state extended south- wards from its base in Rascia. In the next two centuries many Albanians adopted Serb names and became assimilated. Subsequently the region came under the Ottoman Empire, which had modern Turkey as its hub. The instability resulting from the decay of this empire caused a fresh wave of Albanian migration. In being forced to seek the protection of Muslim war- lords, the price was often conversion to Islam. It was not until about the middle of the 19th century that Kosovo came to have a majority of Albanian speakers. The subsequent relative decline of the Serb population owes to factors such as the area’s backwardness which prompted Serbian migration, the fact that Serbs were concentrated largely in urban areas where the birth- rate was lower, and, crucially, the high abortion rate among Serbs. Today Kosovo has a vast majority of Albanians with the great majority of town and village names remaining Serb.
