About Us

Cultural transfer is a widely studied construct due to its associations with Europeanization. However, no individual project or study has been designed to contribute to the understanding of how cultural transfer Europe-Serbia shaped modern Serbia. Whereas models of cultural transfer are present in the literature, no research was ever conducted to significantly widen the scope of understanding of modern Serbian history, its modernization and its Europeanization including the issue of how Serbian national identity was formed and other relevant identities in Serbia were shaped.

With the emergence of World Capitalist System in the 16th century the issue of European cultural transfer has become a global issue. In symbolic geography of Enlightenment all of the Ottoman Empire was seen as Asia. As a part of that Empire, Serbia was also seen an area outside of Europe. As soon as modern Serbia emerged in the early 19th century the issue of its relations with European powers and with European models became crucial.

Although there is a well-established methodology in analyzing cultural transfer, the fresh multidimensional perspective will lead to a potential new model in understanding of how cultural transfers may operate. The whole project has been designed in multi-disciplinary terms and it combines methods of historiography, history of ideas, literary history, anthropology and imageology. Novelty is a multidimensional and multidisciplinary approach: as a narrative, policy, representation, perception, ideology and cultural construct.

The project is expected to have an impact on future related research but will also have a practical application due to its web-site with data base that will be beneficial for project-designed teaching in primary and secondary schools as well as presenting links between Serbia and Europe to all potential beneficiaries: foreign students, scholars, Serbian diaspora all around Europe, or used as a search tool for various regional projects.