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Tito’s Last Pioneers and the Politicization of Schooling in Yugoslavia

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Childhood and Schooling in (Post)Socialist Societies

Abstract

The chapter explores childhood experiences in the former Yugoslavia and interrogates the memories of eight years of elementary schooling between 1987 and 1995. Focusing on the so-called last generation of Yugoslav leader Tito’s pioneers, I examine some of my personal experiences of childhood and schooling while connecting and juxtaposing them with the wider socioeconomic and cultural context. The first part of the chapter critically describes daily schooling practices, uniforms, and celebrations in socialist Yugoslavia. The second part is set up against the backdrop of the violent disintegration of Yugoslavia and studies the emerging new practices as well as schoolchildren’s reaction to them, highlighting a shift in politicization processes and their impact on children’s identities.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    “Brotherhood and unity” (“bratstvo i jedinstvo”) was a popular slogan of the Communist Party of the former Yugoslavia, which was also enshrined in the 1974 Yugoslav constitution.

  2. 2.

    Mixed-grade classes did not exist, although they were common in village schools, particularly before World War II when the village teacher (“seoski učitelj”) was tasked with the elementary education of all the village children.

  3. 3.

    For an analysis of the role of schools in the building of multicultural national imaginary and the use of textbooks, see Silova et al. (2014) and Millei and Imre (2015).

  4. 4.

    The text was originally written in French. One of Popović’s interviewees exclaims: “c’était le plus beau pays du monde” (Popović, 2013, p. 76).

  5. 5.

    See Woodward (1985) for an analysis of the significant gap between women’s rights and women’s daily reality in socialist Yugoslavia.

  6. 6.

    Some of these works include Božinović (1996), Papić (1989), Sklevicky (1989), and Drakulić (1984), Mladjenović (n.d.), among others.

  7. 7.

    Today, Santa Claus brings gifts on January 7 which is Christmas Day for Orthodox Serbians. December 25 is Christmas Day for Catholics in Serbia and elsewhere.

  8. 8.

    For a brief overview of the history of communist and post-communist events, see Baskin and Pickering (2011).

  9. 9.

    For more on the reasoning behind and the effects of the economic sanctions, see Woodward (1995).

  10. 10.

    When a group of high-school students from Pakrac, Croatia, dressed up as Tito’s pioneers and walked through the town in February 2016, some locals reported them to the authorities. Subsequently, the students issued an apology. Accessed July 4, 2016. http://www.slobodnadalmacija.hr/novosti/hrvatska/clanak/id/302838/srednjoskolce-u-pakracu-prijavili-policiji-jer-su-se-maskirali-u-tita-jovanku-i-pionire; http://www.compas.com.hr/clanak/3/1942/tito-i-pioniri-proetali-pakracom.html

  11. 11.

    The “Yugoslav” nationality, distinguished by quotation marks from Yugoslav citizenship, was originally introduced in the 1971 census. For an interpretation of ethnic relations, demographics, and population policies in socialist Yugoslavia , see Besemeres (1980).

  12. 12.

    Two or three out of the five separate classes were usually assigned English, while the remaining classes would be required to learn Russian. My class was assigned English.

  13. 13.

    The text was originally written in French: “L’identité yougoslave reste toujours vivante, dans la mémoire, dans les sentiments et dans l’expression politique […]” (Popović, 2013, p. 79).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, Canada

    Anna Bogic

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  1. Anna Bogic
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, USA

    Iveta Silova

  2. Faculty of Education, University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland

    Nelli Piattoeva

  3. Institute for Advanced Social Research, University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland

    Zsuzsa Millei

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Bogic, A. (2018). Tito’s Last Pioneers and the Politicization of Schooling in Yugoslavia. In: Silova, I., Piattoeva, N., Millei, Z. (eds) Childhood and Schooling in (Post)Socialist Societies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-62791-5_7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-62791-5_7

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-62790-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-62791-5

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