Language and folklore in the Balkans

Language and folklore in the Balkans

Project Director: Biljana Sikimić, PhD, principal research fellow

 

The project starts from the synchronous phenomenon of migration and mobility in the Balkans, which are researched in the field. During the analytical procedure they are supplemented by the analysis of historical material, folklore and literary text. Team field research (different qualitative interviews with interlocutors) is based on the principle of respecting the interlocutor's idiom, but quantitative methods are used to investigate language competences in contact idioms and standard languages. Older, traditional diasporas are explored in a transnational aspect: Serbs in Romania and Hungary. The next circle of interests is the modern transformation of traditionally semi-nomadic communities in the Balkans (Roma, Ashkali, Banjasi, Djorgovci) and forced and organized migration and colonization in Vojvodina during the twentieth century, the mobility of Muslim communities in Serbia, labor migration from Serbia to Europe, the phenomenon of seasonal workers in Serbia, and finally - mixed marriages in Banat and northeastern Serbia.

Interdisciplinary studies of the Balkan space is in the field оf Balkan linguistics, documentary linguistics, ethnolinguistics, anthropological linguistics, sociolinguistics, folklore, psycholinguistics, corpus of linguistics, fieldwork methodologies, oral history, as well as some aspects of anthropology, anthropology of migration, media and minorities.

 

Project members:

Biljana Sikimić, PhD, principal research fellow

Anemari Sorescu-Marinković, PhD, senior research associate

Marija Ilić, PhD, senior research associate

Svetlana Ćirković, PhD, senior research associate

Mirjana Mirić, PhD, research associate

Anđela Redžić, MA, junior research assistant