Multiple Nationalism of Habsburg Trieste’s 'Slavic Society' (1848–1858)

• In Event: Nationalism and the Growth of the Public Sphere in Habsburg Central Europe

Abstract

Scholars have until recently been interpreting the Slavic Society (Slavjansko društvo) established in 1848 Trieste as one of the first Slovene nationalist organizations. This presentation, however, argues that this voluntary association has only in the eyes of the subsequent, late 19th and early 20th century national activists anachronistically been understood as Slovene. The Slavic Society can in a way indeed be understood as such because some of its members thought of themselves as primarily Slovene. Still, the archival sources reveal that, firstly, the notion of “Slovenness” kept changing throughout the second half of the 19th century and is hence not equal to its contemporary use and, secondly, that besides Slovene the Slavic Society wholly unproblematically accommodated also many other collective identifications; for instance, Panslavism, Illyrism, Yugoslavism, and other subsequently more or less successful national sentiments. Even more, the same members of the Slavic society could have simultaneously been adhering to multiple Slavic national movements.
Unlike the observed mid-19th century historical actors, the later viewers found the absence of clear definitions, categories, and boundaries perplexing and unfeasible, which resulted into naïvely identifying the Slavic Society in terms of modern national belongings that actually, at least in the case of Trieste, spread later. The presentation will thus seek to question the Slavic Society as one of the crucial means supporting Trieste’s Slovene character, demonstrate that a variety of identifications in 1848 easily lived side by side, and contribute to the ongoing debates about the phenomenon of multiple nationalism within the Habsburg Empire.

Author

• Daša Ličen, Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts