FIGURES OF (TRANS-) NATIONAL RELIGIOUS MEMORY OF THE ORTHODOX SOUTHERN SLAVS BEFORE 1945: AN OUTLINE ON THE EXAMPLES OF SS. CYRIL AND METHODIUS
FIGURES OF (TRANS-) NATIONAL RELIGIOUS MEMORY OF THE ORTHODOX SOUTHERN SLAVS BEFORE 1945: AN OUTLINE ON THE EXAMPLES OF SS. CYRIL AND METHODIUS

Summary/Abstract: Analyzing figures of national religious memory of the orthodox Southern Slavs, we focus on the changes concerning the temporal horizon, the contents, carried and brought to mind by the figures, and the forms of collective identity that were produced or reinforced by these realisations in their specific social or ‘national’ situation. This essay outlines as examples changes in the veneration of Cyril and Methodius, and shows how they became, within the framework of national movements, important crystallisation points for national identities, although initially their traditional veneration was to a high degree Slavonic, or transnational. National identity was more and more isolated from the transnational context – until then reference to the other Slavonic peoples served only to demonstrate the historic importance of their ‘own’ nation’s mission. One can distinguish more or less clearly a secularisation of the saints in the 19th century, within the context of historicism and nationalism; while during the 1930s and World War II they served the sacralisation of nationalism.

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