Renaming Fashion

As it has been done in these areas many times before, it seems that the time has come for the new war victors to start history anew by erasing all names and titles, from geographic maps, dictionaries, encyclopedias, telephone directories as well as railway and airline time-tables, even though it is exactly these names and titles that dispute their aspirations that history begins with them.

Introduction of linguistically and ethnically clean toponymy and uprooting of the symbols of co-habitation has, as some believe, its own subconscious psychological dimension - the names of places, which now many perceive to have become synonymous with senselessness, crime and suffering, are being wiped out.

All three warring sides have quite seriously undertaken the task of linguistic cleansing in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Following the developments in Zagreb, the Croats made a "comeback" to the Croatian language as early as in Spring 1990, renaming everything that might have a non-Croatian "odour." A little later, the Croatian majority population of Duvno decided in the referendum to return to the town its old name - Tomislavgrad, dating from the period of the Austrian-Hungarian rule. Although they officially support the Vance-Owen plan and Bosnia, as a joint state of the three peoples, the Croatian officials persistently avoid using the official name of this internationally recognized state, giving preference to the historic name of "Herzeg-Bosnia." For a while now it has been impossible to find in Herzeg-Bosnia any symbols of the Bosnian state - the flag, the coat-of-arms and the currency -everything is exclusively Croatian.

Some time ago the Muslim leadership appropriated the attribute "Bosnian". Ahead of the elections in B-H in 1991, the citizens of Sarajevo, mostly Muslim, could find leaflets in their mail-boxes, with the instructions where the Party of the Democratic Action simply explained to the people that their faith is Islam, their nation Muslim and their language Bosnian.

When asked to explain what the "Bosnian language" actually means and that the "American language" does not exist if the same logic is applied, Alija Isakovic, who, as many claim, has coined the syntagm of the "Bosnian language", replied, "So many clever things from America have not been adopted here. I don't see why should we adopt such a stupidity." From what is known, the introduction of the Bosnian language was not followed by further "bosnisation" and the change of towns' names since that would clash with the official policy of the continuity of former Bosnia-Herzegovina...

Izetbegovic's leadership insisted on appropriating everything with the modifier "Bosnian". This seems to have been a clue for the Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic to start clearly distancing himself day by day from everything which might remind of Bosnia and of the once joint life. The project is nearly over, so that it could be said right now that the Bosni-Herzegovinian Serbs have completely given up on the term "Bosnian." Their state was first called the Serb Republic Bosnia-Herzegovina, then the Serb Republic, only to finally become the Republic of Srpska (while the former joint state is exclusively referred to as "the former Yugoslav republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina). After initially being "expelled" from the names of the state and regions, Bosnia was then erased from the towns' names. Bosnian Krupa has become Krupa on Una, Bosnian Novi - Novi Grad, Bosnian Dubica - Kozarska Dubica, while the Bosnian Brod, Bosnian Gradiska, Bosnian Grahovo, Bosnian Petrovac, Bosnian Samac and Bosnian Kostajnica have been left without "Bosnian." The only thing that reminds of Bosnia on the territory of the Republic of Srpska is the bank note which was issued when their republic had a different name.

The thoughts of Radoslav Unkovic, the Director of the Institute for Protection of Cultural, Historical and Natural Heritage of the Republic of Srpska, with its seat on Mount Jahorina, speak best in favour of ambitions and thoroughness employed in the task of linguistic cleansing of toponyms. By the end of the last year Unkovic already (in the Belgrade daily "Vecernje Novosti") explained that all names "which are associated with evil and where the Serbian tradition was effaced will undergo change." "We shall spare no effort in building the toponymy in accordance with the Serbian tradition," he said, adding that "Sarajevo was to meet its fate in this view."

Contrary to the claim that the names "which are associated with evil" will be changed, the first to bear the brunt of linguistic cleansing was Ilidza, which in Turkish means "cure." At the moment it could not be said with certainty whether this means changing the title of the book "The Bridge on the Zepa", by the Nobel Prize winner Ivo Andric ("The Bridge on the Drina" is automatically suspicious), but it can be certainly foreseen that, relying on the Bosnian experience, Andric himself would nowadays shed light on the current events with the following words, "The authorities can perform anything. The only thing they cannot is to turn a woman into a man. All the rest is within their power."

Djordje Stankovic, the historian and professor at the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade, was asked by VREME to comment, from the historical point of view, on the claims that any mention of Bosnia is something foreign to the Serbs. Professor Stankovic said this had to do more with the political dictate, rather than with history. "The issue concerns the political motive related to the conclusion of the Serb national integration. The trouble is, however, that the historic awareness can not be built overnight. All of it is a part of a widely spread habit in the region that everything gets frequently destroyed and built anew, which determines us as the people who lacks a civilizational relationship with all periods of its development. The world often failed to grasp this at full, since the Crusades are the matter of the past as far as it is concerned. But, we always tend to approach these things with a Balkan slant. I don't think that the past should be defended at any cost, but, on the other hand, I'm not inclined to forget everything and reduce it on the pages, which some future generations will accept as historical blanks."

The change of toponyms, such as the one underway in Bosnia-Herzegovina is not new to history, Stankovic stressed (the Chinese Dynasties, the French Revolution...) "But, in Bosnia, this has taken on drastic proportions," the professor said, and went on, "Those changes of toponyms speak in favour of a kind of a psychological relationship with the nations and religions, that are fought against in the war. The Croatian director and the current head of the Croatian Television (HTV), Antun Vrdoljak, has probably been most successful in illustrating this in one of his partisan films, by saying - never have there been more churches in a smaller area. Even today I can remember a scene in the film when two armies are fighting each other with a church and a mosque in the background. There were the weapons talk, the language tends to be much sharper, just like the cuts between those who used to live together until yesterday. By changing the names of places and other toponyms the national integration id being carried out, the legitimacy of the authorities is being established, one's own former civilizational clues are being sought, while everything hateful is being effaced with the help of new names. Social, pathological and tribalistic hatred is involved as well."

According to Professor Stankovic, this phenomenon has its scientific explanation. There are such cases where a return to one's roots and natural being is valid. In some cases the objective is to bridge the Turkish gap and find an old name, which is not at all unusual in the areas where conquering, migration, moving of whole families and villages frequently occur. Professor Stankovic can also make out a human dimension in all that is taking place in Bosnia, for which he shows understanding based on his own experience.

"As a scholar I'm telling you one thing, but as a man whose birthplace on Mount Papuk in Slavonija was burnt and leveled to the ground, I could say something else, although that might portray me as a Homo duplex. When you've had your home destroyed, it is very difficult to resist in a solely rational way. I often catch myself thinking, that I would build that burnt village of mine some place else and give it the same name if I had the money. That is why I do understand those people whose existential roots were plucked in this war. Thus, I can relate to some of their reactions to the change of toponyms."

Milosav Tesic, the lexicographer at the Institute for the Serbian Language, who uses toponyms in his poetry, claims that what is being carried out in Bosnia under the title of linguistic cleansing is a crazy fashion and violence against language. "Nothing can be achieved in a language through political will and decrees," Tesic said. "All this reminds of the post war era when many towns changed their names, only to return the old ones once again. I have some understanding for the kind of change, such as when Titograd became Podgorica, since the name of Titograd was imposed on it. But, I have no understanding whatsoever for this sudden need and haste to deny everything which is modified by "Bosnian." Bosnia is neither Serbian, Turkish, nor Croatian. The names of settlements and other toponyms are of universal importance; therefore, the local surrounding and the local decision-taking cannot exclusively claim the right to change them. Such practice simply impedes normal communication. It would be wiser to wait for the end of the war, and, then, think it over in peace so that mistakes are avoided. If the logic of cleansing the language and toponyms is pursued, we can expect many things to have the same fate in store. We use different words of foreign origin on a daily basis, and I'm not sure where this search for their replacement would take us."

One day, the whole generations might feel like strangers if all which someone here today finds "so hateful" is uprooted from their conscience. Many might get to perceive themselves as "burnt bridges", as Vladimir Pistalo, the writer from Sarajevo, described the position of many people from Bosnia in one of the issues of VREME last summer. That is when he wondered, "Should a Serb from Bosnia, responding to a tacit requirement posed by the time, deprive himself of his Croat and Muslim friends with whom he used to share the table, or women with whom he shared the bed?

Should he vilify them while purposefully searching his experience for evidence against them? Wouldn't he forge his own experience by doing so? By overloading his feelings with evil, he would turn them into a sort of a garbage container..."