CONFERENCES
CROATIA AND CROATIANS IN THE 20TH
CENTURY
(AN INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM HELD
IN SYDNEY,
AUSTRALIA, OCT. 2-7, 1988)
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Journal
of Croatian Studies, XXVIII-XXIX, 1987-88 - Annual Review of the Croatian Academy of America,
Inc. New York, N.Y., Electronic edition by Studia Croatica, by
permission. All rights reserved by the Croatian Academy of America.
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The Symposium was organized by the Croatian Studies Foundation of Australia and New Zealand and the Croatian Studies at Macquarie University (with a grant from the New South Wales Government), under the leadership of two professors, Luka Budak and Fr. Gracijan Biršić. They invited a number of Croatian scholars from Australia, North and South America, and Europe. From Australia: Šime Dušević, Dalibor and Damir Ivković, Dr. Stephen Klarić, Dr. Robert Meštrović, Ivan Nimac, Prof. Elizabeta Ninčević, Fr. Paul Stanhouse and Nenad Zakarija. From North America: Ante Beljo, Dr. Joseph Čondić, Dr. Ante Čuvalo, Dr. Asaf Duraković, Prof. Lovorka and Marija Fabek, Dr. Ante Kadić, Fr. Ljubo Krasić, Dr. Vladimir Markotić, Dr. Emil Primorac, and Dr. Krsto and Dr. Mario Spalatin. From South America: Dr. Zdravko Sančević. From Europe: Fr. Šimun Čorić and Dr. Henrik Heger; directly from Croatia, Pero Budak, poet and actor, Vlado Gotovac, writer and philosopher, Ante Starčević, sculptor, and Stjepan Šešelj, poet. Invited from Croatia were also: Dr. Branimir Banović, Prof. Dušan Bilandžić, Dr. Ivan Čizmić, Tomislav Ladan, writer, and Prof. Ivan Supek, as well as Dr. Vinko Grubišić from Canada, but they didn't come.
The topics treated and discussed
were very different, from music and folklore to archeology, history, linguistics, literature, psychology, scientific
methodology and language teaching for immigrants. Anyone that has attended
conventions or symposia knows that the main advantage of it comes from meeting
people, from discussing ideas generated from formal talks, and simply
exchanging experiences. And so it was in Sydney's symposium. The papers and the
talks were of different nature. We could divide them into two categories,
scholarly papers based in research and broad outlines. Most were historical
outlines, like Croatian immigrants in USA, Canada, South America, Australia,
Europe, folk-dance, culture, Croatian poets in emigration, animated cartoons in
Croatia, Fraternal Union in USA and Canada, Starčević's political
thought in today's Croatia, Croatian welfare organizations in Australia,
Saturday schools of Croatian language for immigrants, etc. In the first
category one may mention: international labor mobility, methodology of research
in the Croatian cultural area, kinship systems in Croatia, a study in
contrastive linguistics, etc.
In Sydney's symposium some sharp
exchanges took place during the question and answer period following the
delivery of papers.
One such exchange occurred between
Prof. Vlado Gotovac and Dr. Asaf Duraković. The latter commented upon the
lack of basic freedoms in the present-day Republic of Croatia within the
Yugoslav communist state. Speaking rather emphatically at one point he exclaimed:
"Until Croatia becomes free, she does not exist for us!" And also:
"Croatia will not be liberated by symposia, but by fighting!" This
elicited a loud applause from a part of the audience. Vlado Gotovac, who spent
six years in Yugoslav jails for the cause of Croatia's freedom, asked to be
heard. He gave an eloquent reply beginning approximately with these words:
"I cannot help but feel sad when I hear that I have just come to Australia
from a nation that does not exist. I really feel even worse when I think I have
been deprived of my personal freedom for a non-existing cause." Referring
to Dr. Durakovič's mention of fighting Prof. Gotovac continued: "I am
a Christian and use other means. In accordance with my principles I am against
the use of any kind of violence". He also received a lively applause for
his remarks. I agree with Mr. Zlatko Drapać (Nova Hrvatska, October 30,
1988) that this exchange of opinions between a Croatian émigré and a Croatian
from today's Croatia reflects the two attitudes held by some Croatians abroad
and at home.
Duraković-Gotovac controversy
brought into focus a very serious problem (shared by other nationalities too).
Those two strong personalities articulated deep psychological frustrations: the
émigrés have an abiding emotional attachment to their homeland, on the other
hand, they are alienated from its present condition of political impotency, its
submission to the Yugoslav regime, its non-sensical debilitating economic
system — all of which sets Croatians significantly back from the Western
European scene of which they feel they are an integral part. Of course, there
is a third attitude among émigrés, more level-headed and more constructive.
The participants of the Symposium
seemed very much disturbed by this incident, in as much as it appeared to pit
Croatians against each other, those in Croatia against those outside of it. And
yet, no one felt that antagonism, and the Symposium proceeded as if nothing had
happened. So strong was the desire for mutual understanding! These impressions
of mine were corroborated by other participants, among others by my son Mario
whose notes I abundantly used in writing this report.
Perhaps the most interesting
insight one received at the Symposium was from the Wednesday evening roundtable
discussion sensitively and sensibly chaired by Fr. Ćorič. The topic
was "The Quest for Identity: Socialisation and Cultural Duality among
Young Croatian Australians", and the panelists were all daughters and sons
of Croatian immigrants to Australia: Robert Meštrovič, Vesna
Lovoković, Stephen Klarič, Marijana Šoljić and Damir
Ivkovič.
Damir Ivkovič led the
discussion by reading a well-thought out, provocative and insightful comment on
how second-generation Croatians in Australia feel. Yes, he said, Croatian
immigrant families did well in providing for the material needs of their
children: within a few years of their arrival, they built homes of some
substance, and raised their standard of living. But, the spiritual side of
things suffered. Telling their children that they are Croatian and should be
proud of it, is not sufficient. Repeating the name Croatian by itself will not
give much content to all it implies. Furthermore, parents cannot just rely on
their authority for effective guidance of their offsprings. Parents too must
learn and listen to their children's needs. "My parents kept telling me to
go to school and learn and become a doctor, lawyer or engineer, but they did
not do much to learn about their new Australian culture," pointed out a
young Australian Croatian. This prompted another youth to exclaim: "There
ought to be a school for parents!" Some parents also spoke up and appeared
at first to be taken aback by this "ingratitude", but soon it became
abundantly clear that the young people were indeed proud of what their parents
had done, and were interested in knowing more about Croatia. One practical
problem came up. Should second-generation Croatians go to Croatia for extended
visits? An overwhelming YES was the answer, but that was tempered by the side
effect of economically supporting a regime inimical to Croatia's national
interests. We are now back in the frustrating misunderstanding
Duraković-Gotovac, aren't we? In the Socialist Republic of Croatia there
is more than a transient regime, THERE IS the "eternal" Croatia.
In the USA usually the second
generation of immigrants is already assimilated, whereas in Australia
university students of Croatian parents speak Croatian and are able to discuss
in that language more than every day activities. Such an approach to the new
culture might be helpful in the search for identity: the foreign origin instead
of being sometimes a handicap may become an advantage.
In order to show the quality of
some papers I shall describe three personal impressions. In his paper "Spiritual
Croatia: Remoteness and Proximity of the Homeland" Mr. Stjepan Šešelj made
an important point concerning the philosophy of life of the poet Viktor Vida.
It is generally assumed that Vida did not care to get involved in political
factions of his time. It is usually thought that he was a good patriot but not
a nationalist. Yet in his poem Duhovna Hrvatska (The Spiritual Croatia) Vida
pledges allegiance to an ideal eternal Croatia beyond our empirical world
expressing his fidelity and love in a terse line
Nama
se, istina, žuri, ali što za nju znači sitniš stoljeća? (Today we
are in a hurry, of course, but for Croatia centuries are trifles). The reading
of the entire poem brings up the point convincingly.
Dr. Henrik Heger, professor at the
Parisian Sorbonne, in his paper "Methodology of Research in the Croatian
Cultural Area" describes the unusual attitude of the Frenchman Jean Dayre
who in the 1930s was sent by the French government to Yugoslavia to teach
French at the University of Zagreb. Everybody agrees that foreigners shouldn't
meddle in the political affairs of the host country. But in the cultural sphere
they should be free to the point of even displeasing the host government in
their choice of scholarly topics. Rare are the foreigners who dare to do so.
Under the Yugoslav royal dictatorship Professor Dayre had the courage to pursue
the study of the Croatian cultural area as a distinct unit.
In my paper
"Anglo-Continental Lexical Contrasts" I analyzed some twenty
international cognates in Croatian, English, French, German and Italian in
order to show that English tends to use a term different from the term used by
other four languages. For instance, English 'country-dance' becomes Croatian
kontradanca, French contredanse, German Kontertanz, Italian contraddanza. By a
twist of popular etymology English 'country' was heard in France as contre
'against, opposite' and spread all over Europe, aided by the fact that during
the performance of the dance partners stand directly opposite each other. One
more example! For the English 'relapse' in the other four languages the
derivatives of the Latin adjective recidivus are used not the ones from
relapsus etc., etc. During the question and answer period, instead of
discussing those contrasts, the opportunity was seized to bring up the lexical
differences between the Croatian and Serbian standard languages like hiljada
and tisuća, because some older speakers of Croatian used hiljada and
tisuća interchangeably. The actor Pero Budak concluded the discussion
confirming the Croatian appropriateness of hiljada, at least for the speakers
of older generations. We may add that the Croatian advocates of a
"consistent" separation of the two languages should create
*tisućarka to replace hiljadarka meaning one thousand dollars or dinars
...
In their invitations the
organizers of the Symposium told us: "There is a strong likelihood that
the proceedings of the Symposium will be published." If so, the possible
readers of our papers will be able to share some of our memorable experiences.
CHRISTOPHER SPALATIN