Time: 23.4.2021 13:00-14:00
Please join us live via Zoom-stream on the following address:
https://helsinki.zoom.us/j/68806089166?pwd=M05FRkVpUEtKMWhrUGk5KzN1RUtR…
Meeting ID: 688 0608 9166
Passcode: 998973
On Mules and Donkeys: Race and Class in the Process of Croatian EUropeanization
In this talk Obad will present her long-term qualitative research on the perception of the European Union in Croatia which is grounded in post- and decolonial theoretical perspectives. It will be focused on the role of intertwined issues of race and class in the construction of and longing for Europe, from the idealized images of elite narratives, such are found in interviews with Croatian negotiators with the EU all the way to the grounded and disenchanting narratives of recipients of EU funds in agriculture who reside in rural areas of Croatia. Obad will particularly examine the notions and lived experiences of Croatian eurocrats employed with the European Commission following the country’s 2013 accession. The presentation will touch upon historical constructs of race related to the broader Balkan (and Slavic) areas only to conclude with “realia” – the ways in which the most recent wave of emigration from Croatia to a number of Western European countries mirrors and perpetuates the existing economic and cultural rifts.
About the speaker
Orlanda Obad is research associate at the Institute of Ethnology and Folklore Research in Zagreb. She has been performing research on the processes of Europeanization in Croatia since 2008. Her research interests include critical rural studies and 1990s in postsocialist context. She co-edited a volume Devedesete. Kratki rezovi [The Nineties. Short Cuts] (2020, with Petar Bagarić).