HISTORY OF SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

The course is foreseen for students at the 1st year of the MA Degree Programme “Comparative International Relations” (curriculum "Eastern Europe", core educational activity).
The historical nature of the course contributes to the multidisciplinary goals of the MA Degree Programme. Furthermore, its geographical focus on South-Eastern Europe constributes to the teaching programmes specifically conceived for MA students interested in deepening their knowledge about that area. The thematic focus on the Second World War and its memory allows to deepening the knowledge related to some historical issues and their legacy in the actual public debates.

The main goal of the course is to observe the Balkan peninsula through the prism of the WW2.

The learning goals are the following:

- to familiarize with and to be able to understand the historical development of the politics which shaped war violence in its variegated forms, particularly against civilians
- to include South-East Europe in a comparative international context
- to become acquainted with the most recent historiographical debate around the course's issues
- to be able to apply this knowledge to a critical understanding of the present time
- to refine your communication skills

A basic knowledge of modern and contemporary history (at least the whole high school history programm; furthermore, at least 6 ECTS in the political, social or historical field, acquired in the framework of the first degree), with a particular attention to Eastern and South-Eastern Europe. In this regard, the reference works are the following (alternatively):

Guido Franzinetti, I Balcani: 1878-2001, Carocci, Roma 2006 (or later editions).
Francesco Guida, L’altra metà dell’Europa. Dalla Grande guerra ai giorni nostri, Laterza 2015, particularly pp. 33-84.
Stefano Bottoni, Un altro Novecento. L’Europa orientale dal 1919 a oggi, Roma, Carocci, 2011 (the parts about South-Eastern Europe).

For a long-term perspective:
Egidio Ivetic, I Balcani. Civiltà confini, popoli (1453-1912), Bologna, il Mulino, 2020.
Armando Pitassio, Corso introduttivo allo studio della storia dell'Europa orientale, Perugia, Morlacchi Editore, 2011 (the parts about South-Eastern Europe).
Giulia Lami, Storia dell'Europa orientale. Da Napoleone alla fine della Prima guerra mondiale, Firenze, Le Monnier, 2019 (the parts about South-Eastern Europe).

The course will look at the Balkan peninsula thourgh the prism of the WW2. The sub-topics which will be examined are the following:

- interpretative issues regarding mass violence (acts of violence perpetrated by Balkan actors; mass violence acted by foreign occupants; interrelations between violence with racist, ethno-religious, socio-economic reasons)
- historiographic silences
- public memories

Stefano Petrungaro, Balcani. Una storia di violenza?, Roma, Carocci, 2012, chapters 1, 4 and 5.
Alexander Korb, Im Schatten des Weltkriegs: Massengewalt der Ustaša gegen Serben, Juden und Roma in Kroatien 1941-1945, Hamburg : Hamburger Edition, 2013 (it. ed.: All'ombra della guerra mondiale. Violenze degli ustascia in Croazia contro serbi, ebrei e rom (1941-1945), Bolsena : Massari Editore, 2018), Introduction, chapters 2 and 4.
Nadège Ragaru, Nationalization through Internationalization. Writing, Remembering, and Commemorating the Holocaust in Macedonia and Bulgaria after 1989, in “Südosteuropa”, vol. 65, n° 2, 2017, pp. 284-315.
Nevenka Troha, Slovenia. Occupation, Repression, Partisan Movement, Collaboration, and Civil War in Historical Research, in ivi, pp. 334-363.
Gentiana Kera, Rethinking the Place of the Second World War in the Contemporary History of Albania, in ivi, pp. 364-387.
Dejan Zec, Escape into normality. Entertainment and Propaganda in Belgrade during the occupation, in X. Bougarel, H. Grandits, M. Vulesica (eds.), Local Dimensions of the Second World War in Southeastern Europe, Abingdon: Routledge, 2019.
Paolo Fonzi, Grecia 1941-1944: una storia sociale e culturale della Resistenza,  in «Passato e presente», 35 (2017), 102: pp. 156-165.
Emily Greble, Sarajevo la cosmopolita: musulmani, ebrei e cristiani nell'Europa di Hitler, Milano: Feltrinelli, 2012, ch. 2-3.
Eric Gobetti, Il mito dell'occupazione allegra: italiani in Jugoslavia (1941-1943), in: Giovanni Contini, Filippo Focardi, Petricioli Marta (eds.), Memoria e rimozione: i crimini di guerra del Giappone e dell'Italia, Roma : Viella, 2010, pp. 163-174.
Tomislav Dulić, Mass killing in the Independent State of Croatia, 1941-1945. A case for comaprative research, in A. Dirk Moses (ed), Genocide. Critical Concepts in Historical Studies, London-New york, Routledge, 2010, pp. 342.372.

For those who can not attend classes: Paolo Fonzi, La storia dei Balcani durante la seconda guerra mondiale. Alcune recenti pubblicazioni, in: “Quellen und Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven und Bibliotheken”, 95 (2015), pp. 471-490.

For those who have the possibility to attend classes:

1. Group presentations (30 minutes max.) on a text in the syllabus.
The aim is to evaluate the oral communication skills, as well as the ability to work synergically with other students (10% of the final grade);

2. Written test (90% of the final grade)
The examination has three main goals:
1) to verifying the knowledge of the main historical facts and processes, as well as the most relevant personalities, with relation to the treated topics
2) to verify the analytical skills and the ability of the student to formulate critical reflections about the historiographical issues emerged during the lessons
3) to verify the knowledge of some elements of historical comparison in the framework of the East-Central and South-East European space.
The written examination (duration: 1½ hours) also aims at verifying the written communicative skills of the student.

For those who do not attend classes:
only the written examination (see above, point 2).

Personal notes are not admitted at the exam. It will be possible to make use of the academic literatures during the first 15 min.

The course includes both lectures, and short oral presentations by the students. The latter are then commented by the teacher, interacting with the participants.

Italian

The teacher is easily available for questions concerning the course at his office hours and by email at stefano.petrungaro@unive.it. Emails have to be written in a formal style (not "Hi prof." or "Salve prof.", but "Good morning", "Buongiorno", and the likes) and should not ask questions whose answer can be found in the information contained in this syllabus. The teacher is also available for discussing final thesis' projects.

written

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Human capital, health, education" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development