Anti-Albanian sentiment or Albanophobia is discrimination and prejudice towards Albanians as an ethnic group, described primarily in countries with a large Albanian population as immigrants, seen throughout Europe.
A similar term used with the same denotation is anti-albanianismMichael Mandelbaum (2000) The new European diasporas: national minorities and conflict in Eastern Europe, Council on Foreign Relations Press p. 234 used in many sources similarly with albanophobia, although its similarities and/or differences are not defined. The opposite for Albanophobia is Albanophilia.
History Albanophobia in the 19th century
In 1889, Spiridon Gopčević published an ethnographic study titled Old Serbia and Macedonia that was a Serbian nationalist book on Kosovo and Macedonia and contained a pro-Serbian ethnographic map of Macedonia. Gopčević's biographer argues that he did not actually go to Kosovo and the study is not based on authentic experiences. Within scholarship, Gopčević's study has been noted for its plagiarisms, manipulations and misrepresentations, especially overstressing the Serbian character of Macedonia. Gopčević's views on Serbian and Albanian populations in Kosovo and also the issue of the Arnautaš theory or Albanians of alleged Serbian (descent) have only been partially examined by some authors.."In 1889 the journalist Spiridon Gopčević (1855-1936) published an allegedly scientific, but for all intents and purposes Serbian nationalist monograph on Macedonia and "Old Serbia" (i.e. Kosovo). Gopčević’s biographer nevertheless argues that the monograph is not the result of authentic experiences and that he was never in Kosovo. While his manipulations with respect to the allegedly Serbian character of Macedonia have already been the topic of exhaustive research, his views on the mutual relations between the Serbian and Albanian populations of Kosovo, in particular with respect to the contested notion of so-called Arnautaš" (Albanians of alleged Serbian (descent), have been only addressed superficially by various authors. Whatever the final judgment might be, Gopčević’s monograph represents a singular attempt to combine sympathies for the cultural development of the Serbian nation with the aspirations of Austria-Hungary as a Great Power in the Balkans." Noted for being an ardent Serbian nationalist, his book Old Serbia and Macedonia is seen as a work that opened the path for unprecedented Serbian territorial claims in the region.
20th century
A series of massacres of Albanians in the Balkan Wars were committed by the Montenegrin Army, Serbian Army and paramilitaries, according to international reports. During the First Balkan War of 1912–13, the Serbia and Montenegro fought against the Ottoman Empire (many Albanians were among the Ottoman forces) and expelled the Ottoman forces in present-day Albania and Kosovo. The anti-Ottoman forces committed numerous war crimes against the Albanian population, which were reported by the European, American and Serbian opposition press.Leo Freundlich: Albania's Golgotha Most of the crimes happened between October 1912 and summer of 1913. The goal of the forced expulsions and massacres of ethnic Albanians was statistic manipulation before the London Ambassadors Conference which was to decide on the new Balkan borders. According to contemporary accounts, between 20,000 and 25,000 Albanians were killed during the first two to four months of the Balkan Wars.Archbishop Lazër Mjeda: Report on the Serb Invasion of Kosova and Macedonia Many of the victims were children, women and old people and were part of a warfare of extermination. Aside from massacres, civilians had their lips and noses severed. After the Second World War, thousands of Cham Albanians in Thesprotia, Greece were victims of forced migration and ethnic cleansing by the National Republican Greek League (EDES) from 1944 to 1945.Evergeti, Venetia; Hatziprokopiou, Panos and Nicolas Prevelakis Oxford University Press.
The Expulsion of the Albanians was a lecture presented by the Yugoslav historian Vaso Čubrilović (1897-1990) on 7 March 1937.
Origins and forms The term "Albanophobia" was coined by Anna Triandafyllidou in a report analysis called Racism and Cultural Diversity in the Mass Media published in 2002.By Russell King, Nicola Mai, Out of Albania: from crisis migration to social inclusion in Italy, pp 114 Although, the first recorded usage of the term comes from 1982 in The South Slav journal, Volume 8 by Albanian author Arshi Pipa.The South Slav journal, Volume 8 page 21, Arshi Pipa (1982). The report by Triandafyllidou represented Albanian migrants in Greece.By Anna Triandafyllidou, Racism and Cultural Diversity In the Mass Media , Robert Schuman Centre, European University Institute, pp. 149
In countries Serbia
The origins of anti-Albanian propaganda in Serbia started in the 19th century with claims made by Serbian state on territories that were about to be controlled by Albanians after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.By Ivo Banac, The national question in Yugoslavia - origins, history, politics, page 293 By the late nineteenth century, Albanians were being characterized by Serbian government officials as a "wild tribe" with "cruel instincts". Jovan Cvijić said that Albanians were "the most barbarous tribes of Europe."Stefanović, Djordje (2005). "Seeing the Albanians through Serbian eyes: The Inventors of the Tradition of Intolerance and their Critics, 1804-1939." European History Quarterly. 35. (3): 472. "Officials of the Serbian Ministry of Foreign affairs described Albanians as a 'wild tribe' with 'cruel instincts'... A number of Serbian intellectuals and journalists added to the angry hate propaganda that seemed to culminate during the preparations for the Balkan Wars. Cvijić argued that 'there is a general consensus that the Albanians are the most barbarous tribes of Europe'. Another intellectual described the Albanians as 'European Indians' and 'lazy savages'", Meanwhile, politician Vladan Đorđević described Albanians as "modern Troglodytes" and "prehumans who slept in the trees", claiming they still had "tails" in the nineteenth century.Gay, Peter (1993). The Cultivation of Hatred: The Bourgeois Experience: Victoria to Freud (The Bourgeois Experience: Victoria to Freud). WW Norton & Company. p. 82. "In 1913, Dr. Vladan Djordjević, a Serbian politician and expert in public health, characterized Albanians as bloodthirsty, stunted, animal-like, so invincibly ignorant that they could not tell sugar from snow. These "modern Troglodytes" reminded him of "prehumans, who slept in the trees, to which they were fastened by their tails." True, through the millennia, the human rail had withered away, but "among the Albanians there seem to have been humans with tails as late as the nineteenth century.""
Historian Olivera Milosavljević has written about the historical construction of Albanians as enemies of Serbs in Serbia through Serbian politicians and writers. Beginning in the 19th century, negative stereotypes regarding Albanians were formed by some Serbian authors. Albanians were described as enemies who by the 16th century had been instigated to terrorize Serbs by the Ottomans. According to Milosavljević, part of the modern intellectuals in Serbia wrote about Albanians mainly within the framework of these stereotypes, regarding their "innate" hatred and desire for the destruction of Serbs, which was a product of their dominant characteristic of "primitivism" and "robbery". Beginning in the mid-1980s, words such as "genocide", "oppression", "robbery", and "rape" were used when referring to Albanians in speeches, so that any mention of Albanians as a national minority contained negative connotations. Milosavljević has also noted how earlier authors depicted Albanians as incapable of having an autonomous state due to their "incivility", promoted and manipulated the stereotype of ‘Arbanised’ Serbs, leading to the contemporary claim that Skanderbeg was a Serb.
Throughout the 1930s, a strong anti-Albanian sentiment existed in the country and solutions for the "Kosovo question" were put forward, and it involved large-scale deportation. These included Yugoslav-Turkish negotiations (1938) that outlined the removal of 40,000 Albanian families from the state to Turkey and another was a memorandum (1937) entitled The Expulsion of the Albanians written by a Serbian scholar Vaso Čubrilović (1897–1990). The document proposed methods for expelling Albanians that included creating a "psychosis" by bribing clergymen to encourage the Albanians to leave the country, enforcing the law to the letter, secretly razing Albanian inhabited villages, ruthless application of all police regulations, ruthless collection of taxes and the payment of all private and public debts, the requisitioning of all public and municipal pasture land, the cancellation of concessions, the withdrawal of permits to exercise an occupation, dismissal from government, the demolition of Albanian cemeteries and many other methods.Ćubrilović, Vaso, The Expulsion of the Albanians: Memorandum 1937
Aleksandar Ranković, the Yugoslav security chief, had a strong dislike of Albanians. Following the Second World War and until 1966, Ranković upheld Serbian control of Kosovo through repressive anti-Albanian policies.
During the end of the 1980s and the beginning of the 1990s, activities undertaken by Serbian officials in Kosovo have been described as Albanophobic.By Nebojša Popov, Drinka Gojković, The road to war in Serbia: trauma and catharsis, pp. 222
The Serbian media during Milošević's era was known to espouse Serb nationalism while promoting xenophobia toward the other ethnicities in Yugoslavia. Ethnic Albanians were commonly characterized in the media as anti-Yugoslav counter-revolutionaries, rapists, and a threat to the Serb nation.International Centre Against Censorship. "Forging War: The Media in Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina". International Centre Against Censorship, Article 19. Avon, United Kingdom: Bath Press, May 1994. P55 During the Kosovo War, Serbian forces continually discriminated Kosovo Albanians:
In regards to the Albanian war victims Obrad Stevanović wrote "No body – no crime” in the diary he kept in 1998 and 1999, when he met, as a high-ranking official Serbian MUP, with Slobodan Milosevic. He admitted at Hague tribunal that these constituted notes from a meeting with the president.
A 2011 survey in Serbia showed that 40% of the Serbian population would not like Albanians to live in Serbia, while 70% would not enter into a marriage with an Albanian individual.
In 2012, Vuk Jeremić, the-then Serbian Minister of Foreign Affairs, while commenting on Twitter about the Kosovo dispute, compared Albanians to the "evil Orcs" from the movie The Hobbit.Barlovac, Bojana (19 December 2012). "Jeremic Likens Kosovars to 'Hobbit's' Evil Orcs". Balkan Insight. Retrieved 16 May 2015. In 2016, Minister of Foreign Affairs Aleksandar Vulin stated that Albania has no history and wants to steal the Serbian one.
Before the start and during the 2016 UEFA European qualifier between Serbia and Albania in Belgrade that was abandoned, Serbian fans chanted 'Ubij, ubij Šiptara' (Kill, kill the Albanian). During the game, a drone carrying a banner depicting an image of Greater Albania was flown into the pitch, leading to on-field violence. After the game in Serbia, mostly in its northern province Vojvodina, after the match, at least a dozen bakeries and snack bars owned by ethnic Albanians were set on fire in Novi Sad, Sombor and Stara Pazova, and a bomb was used in one case.
During 2017, amidst a background of political tension between Serbia and Kosovo, Serbian media engaged in warmongering and anti-Albanian sentiment by using ethnic slurs such as "Šiptar" in their coverage.