UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London, 7th Annual International Postgraduate Conference

Inclusion Exclusion

16-18th February 2006

Thursday 16 February 2:30 – 4:00: Panel B3: Portrayal of Minorities

Markus Wien (American University in Bulgaria): ‘The Jews of Bulgaria – an exception to the rule?: the position of the Jewish minority in public discourses of modern Bulgaria’

The survival of the Bulgarian Jews in World War II promotes reflections on their position as a minority within the society of the modern Bulgarian national state.

Before 1944, Jewry-related discourses were focused on the question, to which extent the Jews, formerly part of the Ottoman Jewish community, could be integrated into the ethnically defined Bulgarian nation state and serve its principles. The debates ranged from explicitly integrative views to aggressive forms of anti-Semitism, which reached its peak during the years of the alliance with Nazi-Germany with the introduction of Anti-Jewish legislation similar to the German Nuremberg laws.

The fact, however, that deportations of Jews in 1943, organized by the Bulgarian government, were hindered by public protest reveals that anti-Jewish forces had been present in the society, but had never become influential enough to execute an exterminatory policy.

After 1944, the salvation of the Jews became a crucial paradigm of the discourse in communist Bulgaria. However, the discussion completely lost any element of reflection about the position of the Jewry itself in the Bulgarian society. Instead, the narrative of the salvation of the Jews assumed the function of a heroic near-to mythological act within the framework of Bulgaria’s national history.

In general, the post-war discourse became a paradox. Its high intensity, which grew even after 1989, stood in a bizarre contradiction with the fact that, despite its physical survival, the Jewish minority in Bulgaria practically had ceased to exist after the war: 45,000 out of the 48,000 Jews emigrated to Israel. The rest was unable to establish an alternative discourse under the conditions of Stalinism. During these years the Jewry-related discourse in Bulgaria lost any positive or negative concern with the Jews and, instead of being an element of Bulgarian minority-related debates, became an essential part of the Bulgarian nationalist self-assertion: as a victory over "Hitlerism and fascism".