The New German-speaking School of Balkankompetenzen: Knowledge production and truth claims in post-colonial post-communist context

Abstract

In this paper, I show how some strands of contemporary Western scholarship in Albanian studies reproduce substantive empirical and methodological flaws and perpetuate imperial attitudes and othering stereotypes. In particular, I level a number of criticisms at what I refer to as the New German-speaking School of Balkankompetenzen that has colonized Albanian and more generally Southeastern European issues. I argue that disregard and patronizing of local scholars, and occasionally over-reliance on essentialized, insufficient or misinterpreted research outcomes, can be shown in the writings of various scholars that are representative of strategic othering, methodological essentialism, dubious deconstructionism and outright misinterpretation of Albanian foundational myths, national history, social structures, and cultural behavior. Arguably, this methodological imperialism reproduces a discourse of Western superiority that serves to legitimate Western political, economic and social control.

From the Austrian-Hungarian Point of View: An der schönen blauen Donau and the Accursed Black Mountain Wreath in the Balkans

“…Many of these scholars are contemporary experts and commentators within what I refer to as the New German-speaking School of Balkankompetenzen. 144 Some of these writers put under the spotlight and conventionally describe purported Albanian customary laws, blood feuds and honor killings, religious beliefs, hospitality, marriage codes, archaic family structures, sworn virgins, and patriarchal customs. 145 Others do not hesitate to mount virulent rhetorical attacks of denigration and vilification on the ground of a presumed "irrationality" of a "culture-bounded" people who are believed to be caught into their supposed tribal organization and tribal laws.…”