Romanians from Serbia in Denmark

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church in 1997, financed primarily by its communities abroad. The construction, which started in 1987, could be seen both as acontribution by the diaspora to the revitalising of old religious traditions and as political support for the Serb Orthodox revivalist campaign encouraged by the Milosevic regime (see Juul and Nielsen 2007). At present, many Vlachs also display their religious affiliation openly in Denmark, for example, by wearing large Orthodox crosses or religious bracelets. However, going public with your religious affiliation is not without itscontradictions. Although a Serb Orthodox congregation exists in Copenhagen, only a few Vlachs are affiliated toit. The great majority find the church unwilling to deal with the Vlach variant of Orthodox Christianity, whichis regarded as involving too much superstition. 11 Most ceremonies therefore continue to be performed in the villages of origin, where the priests are less reluctant to converge with theVlach ancestor cult. With this controversy in mind, it was somewhat surprising to find that a growing number of Vlach children now opt for Lutheran confirmation, a ceremony which has no equivalent in the Serb Orthodox Church. Vlach weddings held inDanish churches according to the Lutheran liturgy are also gaining in popularity. Yet fitting in with the DanishChurch does not imply abandoning the Serb Orthodox Church. Rather, it is an act where sameness in terms ofChristianity is valued over difference embodied in the official Serb Orthodox Church. Lacking other public rituals or symbols of integration, these ceremonies—celebrated with pomp and circumstance— serve as yet anothermanifestation of sameness and successful integration. This promulgation of visibility and Danishness in what has hitherto been perceived as a wholly Vlach domain dominated by older women acting as the custodians of the Vlachtradition is a significant topic deserving greater attention in the future. The need to perform such public acts of convergence may have increased as a consequence of the difficult transformation from being Yugoslavs to becoming Serbs. For many migrants, the eradication of Yugoslavia as a state involved important modifications of their status in Danish society, as wellas their previous loyalties towards nation and homeland. At present it is difficult to obtain a precise picture of how loyalties towards the nationalistic project of a Greater Serbia have developed within the Danish
diaspora,as few are keen to discuss this matter. In the 1990s, many diaspora communities in Europe and the USA welcomedthe new nationalistic spirit in Serbia (Hockenos 2003). In Denmark, the diaspora was less eager to attractattention to the Serbian cause. Nonetheless, the majority of Vlachs in Denmark were supporters of Milosevic, aloyalty which seems to have been widespread until 1999. 12 An important factor contributing to commitment to the Serbian cause was the opening of a satellite link toBelgrade in 1991 (Hockenos 2003: 149). This enabled individual immigrants to watch Serbian television directly, and to watch the news that mattered to them in a language they understood. At present the Serbian channels provide the most important source of information, not least among those who have retired, who often have relatively little contact with Danish society. During the war, however, the satellite links communicated not only pro- Serbian versions of the crisis inYugoslavia, but also widespread intolerance towards other ethnic groups. The Albanians in particular weredepicted as primitive Muslims sharing the goal of expelling all Serbs from Kosovo (Arsenijevic 2007). Taking intoconsideration the increasingly xenophobic rhetoric that gained momentum in Denmark in the 1990s with the growing influence of the nationalistic Danish People’s Party (see Kofoed and Simonsen 2007), it is not surprising thatthese antipathies were widespread among the often poorly educated and marginalised Serbian workers. The Danish People’s Party was also among the few to protest against the violation of Serbian sovereignty in relation toKosovo’s independence, an act which is likely to have evoked further sympathy for this party among the Serbs. Inthe version of the Danish People’s Party, however, this protest is often spiced with strong anti-Muslimrhetoric. 13 For some Serbs, the common mistrust with regard to Muslims has induced a sense of sameness between Danes and Orthodox Serbs, as expressed in the quotation below: It is not as difficult for us to integrate as it is for the Muslims. It’s the culture, isn’t it? We’re Christians and they’re Muslims. It’s another God that they believe in. We have the cross and the
Page 1 and 2: From DanishYugoslavs to Danish Serb
Page 3 and 4: contrast to the older members, who
Page 5 and 6: training indicates that, in spite o
Page 7 and 8: oof. A low birth rate (one or two c
Page 9 and 10: Visibility and Invisibility: The Jo
Page 11 and 12: At present, when the industry-based
Page 13 and 14: sameness, away of demonstrating the
Page 15 and 16: encouraging their children to adopt
Page 17: is of vital importance that marriag
Page 21 and 22: Serbian sports events, or facilitat
Page 23 and 24: origin ensures that generational co
Page 25 and 26: 35-53. Federspiel, S. (1998) Arbejd
Page 27 and 28: everyday life in Nordic societies,
Page 29 and 30: visible in everyday encounters, in
Page 31 and 32: Grifin, G & Braidotti, R 2002, ‘W

Romanians from Serbia in Denmark

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