- Centre for Advanced Study Sofia
7 Stefan Karadja Str., vh.3
Sofia 1000, Bulgaria - +359 2 9803704
Diana Mishkova
Centre for Advanced Study Sofia, History, Faculty Member
- History, European History, Intellectual History, Balkan History, South East European Studies, Regionalism, and 25 moreHistory of Ideas, Nations and nationalism, Eastern European Studies, Historical Theory, Bulgarian history, Serbian history, Romanian History, Greek History, History of Nationalism and Nation-Building, Nationalism, National Identity, Balkan Studies, Modernization, Balkans, Occidentalism, Southeastern Europe, Politics of South Eastern Europe, Symbolic Geography, Balkanology, Central and Eastern Europe, Romanian Studies, Modern Greek Studies, Modern Greek History, Nationalism And State Building, and Post-Socialist Societiesedit
- Professor of History and Director of the Centre for Advanced Study in Sofia. Foreign Corresponding Member of the Aust... moreProfessor of History and Director of the Centre for Advanced Study in Sofia. Foreign Corresponding Member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences and Doctor Honoris Causa of Södertörn University, Sweden. Her latest books include 'Rival Byzantiums: Empire and Identity in Sotheastern Europe' (Cambridge UP 2022), 'Beyond Balkanism. The Scholarly Politics of Region Making' (Routledge 2018), and the co-edited 'European Regions and Boundaries. A Conceptual History' (Berghahn Books 2017).edit
This is a comprehensive comparative view of the way the phenomenon of Byzantium has been treated by the historiographies of the polities that have emerged from its remains Bulgaria, Greece, Romania, Serbia and Turkey from the... more
This is a comprehensive comparative view of the way the phenomenon of Byzantium has been treated by the historiographies of the polities that have emerged from its remains Bulgaria, Greece, Romania, Serbia and Turkey from the Enlightenment to the present day. Synthesising a sprawling mass of material largely unknown to academic audiences, it highlights the important place Byzantium's representa tions occupy in the identity building and historical consciousness in that part of Europe. The diverse interpretations of the Byzantine phenomenon across and within these historiographic traditions are scrutinised against the backdrop of shifting geopolitical and cultural contexts, in constant dialogue and competition with each other and in communication with extra regional, western and Russian, academic currents.
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In recent years, western discourse about the Balkans, or "balkanism," has risen in prominence. Characteristically, this strand of research sidelines the academic input in the production of western representations and Balkan... more
In recent years, western discourse about the Balkans, or "balkanism," has risen in prominence. Characteristically, this strand of research sidelines the academic input in the production of western representations and Balkan self-understanding. Looking at the Balkans from the vantage point of "balkanism" has therefore contributed to its further marginalization as an object of research and the evisceration of its agency. This book reverses the perspective and looks at the Balkans primarily inside-out, from within the Balkans towards its "self" and the outside world, where the west is important but not the sole referent.
The book unravels attempts at regional identity-building and construction of regional discourses across various generations and academic subcultures, with the aim of reconstructing the conceptualizations of the Balkans that have emerged from academically embedded discursive practices and political usages. It thus seeks to reinstate the subjectivity of "the Balkans" and the responsibility of the Balkan intellectual elites for the concept and the images it conveys. The book then looks beyond the Balkans, inviting us to rethink the relationship between national and transnational (self-)representation and the communication between local and exogenous - Western, Central and Eastern European - concepts and definitions more generally. It thus contributes to the ongoing debates related to the creation of space and historical regions, which feed into rethinking the premises of the "new area studies."
The book unravels attempts at regional identity-building and construction of regional discourses across various generations and academic subcultures, with the aim of reconstructing the conceptualizations of the Balkans that have emerged from academically embedded discursive practices and political usages. It thus seeks to reinstate the subjectivity of "the Balkans" and the responsibility of the Balkan intellectual elites for the concept and the images it conveys. The book then looks beyond the Balkans, inviting us to rethink the relationship between national and transnational (self-)representation and the communication between local and exogenous - Western, Central and Eastern European - concepts and definitions more generally. It thus contributes to the ongoing debates related to the creation of space and historical regions, which feed into rethinking the premises of the "new area studies."
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It is difficult to speak about Europe today without reference to its constitutive regions—supra-national geographical designations such as “Scandinavia,” “Eastern Europe,” and “the Balkans.” Such formulations are so ubiquitous that they... more
It is difficult to speak about Europe today without reference to its constitutive regions—supra-national geographical designations such as “Scandinavia,” “Eastern Europe,” and “the Balkans.” Such formulations are so ubiquitous that they are frequently treated as empirical realities rather than a series of shifting, overlapping, and historically constructed concepts. This volume is the first to provide a synthetic account of these concepts and the historical and intellectual contexts in which they emerged. Bringing together prominent international scholars from across multiple disciplines, it systematically and comprehensively explores how such “meso-regions” have been conceptualized throughout modern European history.
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This series, a daring project by CEU Press, presents the most important texts that triggered and shaped the processes of nation-building in the many countries of Central and Southeast Europe. The series brings together scholars from... more
This series, a daring project by CEU Press, presents the most important texts that triggered and shaped the processes of nation-building in the many countries of Central and Southeast Europe. The series brings together scholars from Austria, Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Greece, Hungary, the Republic of Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovakia, Slovenia and Turkey. The editors have created a new interpretative synthesis that challenges the self-centered and "isolationist" historical narratives and educational canons prevalent in the region, in the spirit of "coming to terms with the past."
The main aim of the venture is to confront 'mainstream' and seemingly successful national discourses with each other, thus creating a space for analyzing those narratives of identity which became institutionalized as "national canons." The series will broaden the field of possible comparisons of the respective national cultures.
Each text is accompanied by a presentation of the author, and by an analysis of the context in which the respective text was born.
The main aim of the venture is to confront 'mainstream' and seemingly successful national discourses with each other, thus creating a space for analyzing those narratives of identity which became institutionalized as "national canons." The series will broaden the field of possible comparisons of the respective national cultures.
Each text is accompanied by a presentation of the author, and by an analysis of the context in which the respective text was born.
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The volume undertakes a comparative analysis of the various discursive traditions dealing with the connection between modernity and historicity in Southeastern and Northern Europe, reconstructing the ways in which different... more
The volume undertakes a comparative analysis of the various discursive traditions dealing with the connection between modernity and historicity in Southeastern and Northern Europe, reconstructing the ways in which different "temporalities" produced alternative representations of the past and future, of continuity and discontinuity, and identity.
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Modern Balkan history has traditionally been studied by national historians in terms of separate national histories taking place within bounded state territories. The authors in this volume take a different approach. They all seek to... more
Modern Balkan history has traditionally been studied by national historians in terms of separate national histories taking place within bounded state territories. The authors in this volume take a different approach. They all seek to treat the modern history of the region from a transnational and relational perspective in terms of shared and connected, as well as entangled, histories, transfers and crossings. This goes along with an interest in the way ideas, institutions and techniques were selected, transferred and adapted to Balkan conditions and how they interacted with those conditions, resulting in mélanges and hybridization. The volume also invites reflection on the interacting entities in the very process of their creation and consecutive transformations rather than taking them as givens.
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In this scholarly panel, Guido Franzinetti, John Breuilly, Béatrice von Hirschhausen, and Sabine Rutar discuss Diana Mishkova's monograph Beyond Balkanism. The Scholarly Politics of Region Making, published in the Routledge Borderland... more
In this scholarly panel, Guido Franzinetti, John Breuilly, Béatrice von Hirschhausen, and Sabine Rutar discuss Diana Mishkova's monograph Beyond Balkanism. The Scholarly Politics of Region Making, published in the Routledge Borderland Studies series (2018; paperback edition 2020). The panel focuses, from various angles, precisely on how 'region making' has been influenced by scholarly politics and other kinds of policy discourses. The take of each author is conditioned by their respective expertise in European and global area studies.
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Analyzes the processes of nation-building in nineteenth and early-twentieth-century south-eastern Europe. A product of transnational comparative teamwork, this collection represents a coordinated interpretation based on ten varied... more
Analyzes the processes of nation-building in nineteenth and early-twentieth-century south-eastern Europe. A product of transnational comparative teamwork, this collection represents a coordinated interpretation based on ten varied academic cultures and traditions. The originality of the approach lies in a combination of three factors: [a] seeing nation-building as a process that is to a large extent driven by intellectuals and writers, rather than just a side effect of infrastructural modernization processes; [b] looking at the regional, cross-border ramifications of these processes (rather than in a rigid single-country-by-country perspective) and [c] looking at the autonomous role of intellectuals in these areas, rather than just seeing south-eastern Europe as an appendix to Europe-at-large, passively undergoing European influences. The essays explore the political instrumentalization of the concepts of folk, people and ethnos in south-eastern Europe in the “long 19th century” by ...
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The article sets off from a discussion of some methodological and theoretical issues pertinent to the study of ideological and institutional transfer between “centre” and “periphery” in nineteenth-century Europe. While taking into account... more
The article sets off from a discussion of some methodological and theoretical issues pertinent to the study of ideological and institutional transfer between “centre” and “periphery” in nineteenth-century Europe. While taking into account the asymmetry in radiation and reception, it probes into the (Balkan) periphery’s political and cultural agency in reformulating and re-institutionalizing the “western model.” Rather than simply tracing movements, flows and circulation – the conventional concern of the transnational approach – the focus is on studying the transformations which occur in the process. This makes it possible to highlight the dynamics and versatility of ideational and institutional selection, interpretation, adaptation and transformation (or subversion) – in brief, the process of re-signification of ideas and institutions. The article then proceeds by exemplifying this approach in two directions. First, it examines several main channels and agents of transfer to and wit...
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Introduction Part I. Ethnos and Citizens: Versions of Cultural-Political Construction of Identity 1.1 Reconciliation of the Spirits and Fusion of the Interests: A"OttomanismA" as an Identity Politics 1.2 The People Incorporated:... more
Introduction Part I. Ethnos and Citizens: Versions of Cultural-Political Construction of Identity 1.1 Reconciliation of the Spirits and Fusion of the Interests: A"OttomanismA" as an Identity Politics 1.2 The People Incorporated: Constructions of the Nation in Transylvanian Romanian Liberalism, 1838-1848 1.3 A"We, the MacedoniansA": The Paths of Macedonian Supra-Nationalism (1878-1912) 1.4 History and Character: Visions of National Peculiarity in the Romanian Political Discourse of the Nineteenth-Century Part II. Nationalization of Sciences and the Definitions of the Folk 2.1 Barbarians, Civilized People and Bulgarians: Definition of Identity in Textbooks and the Press (1830-1878) 2.2 Narrating 'the People' and 'Disciplining' the Folk: the Constitution of the Hungarian Ethnographic Discipline and the Touristic Movements (1870-1900) 2.3 Who are the Bulgarians? A"Race,A" Science and Politics in Fin-de-Siecle Bulgaria 2.4 Imagining of Nation...
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The article describes the approach to and condenses some of the main arguments presented in the author’s book Beyond Balkansim: The Scholarly Politics of Region Making. It charts the main phases in the scholarly conceptualization of the... more
The article describes the approach to and condenses some of the main arguments presented in the author’s book Beyond Balkansim: The Scholarly Politics of Region Making. It charts the main phases in the scholarly conceptualization of the Balkans and its characteristics and, against this background, tackles the question: What can we learn from the Balkan case about the actual production of regions?
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Notes on contributors, Notes on Transliteration, and Foreword 1. "Forms without Substance": Debates on the Transfer of Western Models to the Balkans (Roumen Daskalov and Diana Mishkova) 2. Balkan Liberalisms: Historical Routes... more
Notes on contributors, Notes on Transliteration, and Foreword 1. "Forms without Substance": Debates on the Transfer of Western Models to the Balkans (Roumen Daskalov and Diana Mishkova) 2. Balkan Liberalisms: Historical Routes of a Modern Ideology (Diana Mishkova) 3. Early Socialism in the Balkans. Ideas and Practices in Serbia, Romania and Bulgaria (Blagovest Njagulov) 4. Agrarian Ideologies and Peasant Movements in the Balkans (Roumen Daskalov) 5. Fascism in Southeastern Europe: A Comparison between Romania's Legion of the Archangel Michael and Croatia's Ustasa (Constantin Iordachi) 6. Communism and Nationalism in the Balkans: Marriage of Convenience or Mutual Attraction (Tchavdar Marinov and Alexander Vezenkov) Index
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The article looks into the various scholarly (and disciplinary) conceptualizations of the Balkans/Southeastern Europe, which were spawned within the region itself prior to World War II. These regionalist schemes drew heavily on political... more
The article looks into the various scholarly (and disciplinary) conceptualizations of the Balkans/Southeastern Europe, which were spawned within the region itself prior to World War II. These regionalist schemes drew heavily on political values and relied on political support, while at the same time seeking to spearhead and legitimize political decisions or reformulate (geo)political visions. The article discusses the political implications of this scholarship with the idea to underscore notions of the Balkans which differed considerably from the one summarily and, in recent years, persistently conceptualized as mirroring the Western (discourse of) Balkanism. Not only were those notions more subtle and differentiated than an ‘orientalizing perspective’ would make us expect; a remarkable feature of the academic projects discussed here was their counterhegemonic thrust and the assertion that the Balkans are and should be treated as a subject.
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In this scholarly panel, Guido Franzinetti, John Breuilly, Béatrice von Hirschhausen, and Sabine Rutar discuss Diana Mishkova’s monograph Beyond Balkanism. The Scholarly Politics of Region Making, published in the Routledge Borderland... more
In this scholarly panel, Guido Franzinetti, John Breuilly, Béatrice von Hirschhausen, and Sabine Rutar discuss Diana Mishkova’s monograph Beyond Balkanism. The Scholarly Politics of Region Making, published in the Routledge Borderland Studies series (2018; paperback edition 2020). The panel focuses, from various angles, precisely on how ‘region making’ has been influenced by scholarly politics and other kinds of policy discourses. The take of each author is conditioned by their respective expertise in European and global area studies.