Skip to main content

More Articles

Thanks to Drita and Rachele who drew my attention to this recent article on Albania and Kosovo in the Economist. According to the Economist, Kosovar Albanians have developed their own distinct identity and have no desire for a political union of all Albanians. The same is true for Albanians spread across the other states in the region. Instead,
A Macedonian Albanian, Teuta Arifi, argues that Albanians should emulate German-speakers, who have built separate identities in Germany, Switzerland and Austria while continuing to belong to the same German culture.
Drita also sent me a link to an article from Balkan Insight summarising recent political developments regarding the elections next month.

Comments

Anonymous said…
The article in the economist is short sighted at best. All those pundits riling against an All-Albanian state stand to lose their cushy jobs and will never agree to anything like it. They've resorted to claim that their opinions apply universally to all Albanians. The situation is quite different.

Please check out page 44 of this rather reputable report

http://www.balkan-commission.org/activities/Report.pdf
8:46 pm
olli said…
Thanks. I will have a look at it.
7:09 pm
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Orthodox Cathedral

These are some pictures of the new Resurrection of Christ Orthodox Cathedral under construction in Tirana. The website of the architectural partnership behind the church has images of how it is planned to look when finished.
40 comments
Read more

Albania and the Perils of the 21st Century

Another article on religion in Albania appeared yesterday. Patrick Poole, writing in the American Thinker , argues that Saudi funding for the construction of mosques and the training of imams is a threat to Albania, since these mosques and imams reflect the fundamentalist interpretation of Islam dominant in Saudi Arabia.
34 comments
Read more

Big in Albania

Ask me how much I knew about Albania before coming here and my list would be a short one: Enver Hoxha, bunkers and Sir Norman Wisdom. I have no idea when or how I acquired this extensive body of knowledge, but the association of Norman Wisdom with Albania was by far the most interesting part of it. I remember watching Norman Wisdom's old films on British television. My parents were fans of his wholesome, slapstick comedy, but apparently missed the ideological significance of Pitkin's relationship with Mr Grimsdale. Pitkin, the downtrodden and oppressed representative of the workers, triumphed every time over his capitalist oppressor, Mr Grimsdale - and he got the girl. It took a theorist of Hoxha's insight and profundity to discern this deeper political message. It always seemed tremendously unlikely, yet the story of Sir Norman's fame in Albania has been reported in worthy sources like the BBC , the Guardian and the Daily Telegraph . According to the Guardian, when Wi...
22 comments
Read more