The lecture analysis has two starting claims. Firstly, Karl Kaser´s contradictory claim that Maria Todorova´s highly relevant book is probably the most read and simultaneously most neglected book on Southeastern Europe in related Area Studies academia. And, secondly, individual academic experiences and related (self-)critique enable insights into characteristics of neglecting the book’s theses and in doing so, into a reproduction of balkanism, related stereotypes, and cultural racism tendencies. Through exploring the lecturer´s experiences, events, and episodes, as well as via usage of elements of Pierre Bourdieu´s social field analysis instruments, the lecture is going to provide answers to the following questions: What events and relationships in the field of Southeast European Studies can be seen as moments of condensation of (self-)balkanization? What are the characteristics of (self-)balkanization encoded in Southeast European Studies field production?

In doing so, the lecture is going to reflect on the starting contradiction and provide fragments for understanding and explaining contradiction (non-)stability.

Lecturer: Dr. habil. Hrvoje Paic, Centre for Southeast Studies, University of Graz.

The lecture will be moderated by Dr. Adam Bence Balazs, Lecturer - Andrássy Universität Budapest - Bratislava International School of Liberal Arts; Fellow Researcher - Laboratoire de Changement Social et Politique (LCSP).

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