Roswitha Kersten-Pejanic
I am a Postdoc Fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies Southeastern Europe at Rijeka University, where I hold a Research Fellowship from the German Research Foundation (DFG) to fund my ongoing project “Linguistic Landscapes at the margins: Performativity of ethnic belonging and memory politics in Croatian post-conflict border regions” (2018-2021).
I completed my PhD thesis on the interrelation of linguistic norms and gender perceptions in Croatian in 2016 at the Center for Transdisciplinary Gender Studies, Humboldt University. After doing my M.A.s in Modern History and Serbian/Croatian at Humboldt University, I also completed an M.A. in EU Studies at theCentre International de Formation Européenne.
Among other things, I have worked as research associate and lecturer in Slavic and Gender Studies at Humboldt University in Berlin and as a trainer and tutor for the non-academic training and consulting association EuroConsults-EUFRAK, also in Berlin. In May 2019, I was an invited scholar for the “Mehrsprachigkeitsmai” at Innsbruck University.
My activities in research, presenting and publishing concentrate on language in the public space, language and politics, ideology, mono- and multilingualism, gender and language, European integration, collective memory, and Southeastern Europe altogether.
https://www.slawistik.hu-berlin.de/de/member/kepejanr
http://cas.uniri.hr/roswitha-kersten-pejanic/
Supervisors: Prof. Dr. Sanja Bojanic and Prof. Dr. Christian Voss
I completed my PhD thesis on the interrelation of linguistic norms and gender perceptions in Croatian in 2016 at the Center for Transdisciplinary Gender Studies, Humboldt University. After doing my M.A.s in Modern History and Serbian/Croatian at Humboldt University, I also completed an M.A. in EU Studies at theCentre International de Formation Européenne.
Among other things, I have worked as research associate and lecturer in Slavic and Gender Studies at Humboldt University in Berlin and as a trainer and tutor for the non-academic training and consulting association EuroConsults-EUFRAK, also in Berlin. In May 2019, I was an invited scholar for the “Mehrsprachigkeitsmai” at Innsbruck University.
My activities in research, presenting and publishing concentrate on language in the public space, language and politics, ideology, mono- and multilingualism, gender and language, European integration, collective memory, and Southeastern Europe altogether.
https://www.slawistik.hu-berlin.de/de/member/kepejanr
http://cas.uniri.hr/roswitha-kersten-pejanic/
Supervisors: Prof. Dr. Sanja Bojanic and Prof. Dr. Christian Voss
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Papers by Roswitha Kersten-Pejanic
The following considerations are based on interviews on the role of language use and different forms of person reference with Croatian feminist and LGBTIQ activists. These interviews shed light on the specific challenges gender-equality activists face when using languages with strict grammatical gender systems, of which Croatian is a characteristic example. Furthermore, this paper alludes to the linguistic alternatives preferred by queer and feminist activism in Croatia, focusing on a range of alternative referential practices and elaborating on the rationale for their use. There are three main strategies of alternative language use in Croatia discussed in the following paper: double reference forms and the slash-variant (such as in profesori i profesorice and profesori/ce), integrating form (profesoricei) and the generic feminine (profesorice).
The analysis of the interview material also leads to the evaluation of the central research question in this paper, i.e., whether, how and to what extent language use is significant for feminist and LGBTIQ activism in the current post-Yugoslav context. To tackle this question, the paper studies accounts on language use provided by Croatian civil society activists fighting for gender equality, women’s issues and for the acceptance of non-normative sexual and gender identities – namely: Lesbian-Gay-Bi-Trans-Inter-Queer (LGBTIQ) rights. The theoretical framework for this analysis is Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of heretical discourse as a counter impulse against a given order and Michael Halliday’s account of anti-languages as both a tool for and a sign of assuming a critical stance on established world order.
Highlights:
- Strong and unavoidable features of grammatical gender pose a problem to gender-fair language use in person reference, especially the linguistic practice of using the masculine word forms to refer to people generically (false generics)
- Feminist and LGBT activists in Croatia produce and use creative alternative referential practices to avoid the usage of masculines as supposedly gender-neutral in politically engaged language use
Keywords:
Alternative referential practices, linguistic norms, false generics, heretical discourse, anti-language
Papers and Book Chapters by Roswitha Kersten-Pejanic
masculine form of the word. Prescriptive Croatian linguists also tend to recommend the use of feminine forms when indexing women, while strongly supporting the use of the masculine as generic naming practice (cf. Babić 2006; and the survey in Glovacki-Bernardi 2012). Correspondingly, there are no strong calls from people concerned about gender-fair language use (cf. Kersten-Pejanić 2017, 231–281) in favor of the strategy of gender-neutralization (cf. Hellinger & Pauwels 2007, 663) in Croatia. Instead, Croatian speakers concerned about gender fair language use mainly opt for the second strategy of feminist language reforms: feminization.
krajobrazima lijepo su mogli pokazati kako su gradovi puni jezičnih znakova kao i da se zapravo i u hijerarhijama i u različitim funkcijama pojedinih jezika dobro mogu zapaziti vladajući diskursi, dominantne norme i vrijednosti jednoga određenog prostora. Međutim, ovdje predstavljeni planovi i prvi rezultati mog istraživačkog projekta pokazuju kako i pretežno jednojezična i ruralna područja mogu poslužiti kao teren za skorašnje istraživanje koje će biti provedeno u okviru interdisciplinarnog pristupa poznatog kao Linguistic Landscape Studies (LLS). S fokusom na pitanja postkonfliktnog statusa određenih
prostora, bivša ratna područja u Hrvatskoj pokazuju nam kako se relacije između jezika i prostora vidljivo mogu manifestirati u krajobrazu. Štoviše, vidi se i kako jezični i semiotički znakovi mogu poslužiti i kao rezultat i kao izvor trajnog i upornog (hladnog) konflikta utemeljenog na narodnostima regionalnih skupina.
The EU has established dominant models regarding social matters, one of which is gender equality. In the phase prior to accession of a given country to the EU, adapting the current dominant model of a political field often constitutes a matter of fulfilling the conditions for actually becoming a member state. Hence, the pre-accession period is a high point regarding a country’s transformation in matters of policies and polities as well as dominant models, discourses and standards, and can be a time of substantial change in belief systems. Gender equality makes up for a notably contested field of social politics, as it is often aimed at changing traditions and orders of social life, traditionally perceived as personal choices and private convictions. This paper is concerned with one aspect of the interplay of these pre-accession features, namely, the possibility of agency for domestic gender experts pushing for changes in the gender equality order of Croatia. In search for such agency, expert interviews have been conducted with political gender actors and members of feminist organisations of Croatian civil society. These interviews provide an insight into the experiences of experts with the Europeanisation of Croatian gender equality standards, and show some aspects of their specific role in the realisation of the relevant provisions
Zusammenfassung:
Die EU setzt Standards in unterschiedlichen Fragen der Sozialpolitik, und damit auch auf dem Gebiet der Gleichstellungspolitik. In der Zeitspanne vor dem Beitritt eines Landes zur EU bedeutet die Übernahme der aktuellen EU Standards eines Politikfeldes zunächst einmal die Erfüllung der von der EU vorgegebenen Beitrittsbedingungen. Entsprechend ist diese Vor-Beitrittsphase eine wichtige Zeit der Anpassung und Transformation in Bezug auf politische Vorgaben und Gesetze, und darüber hinaus von politischen Standards und gesellschaftlichen Diskursen. Somit hat gerade diese Phase des EU-Beitritts das Potential, bedeutende Wandel von Vorstellungen und Meinungsbildern zu begünstigen. Gerade die Gleichstellungspolitik kann als hochgradig umkämpftes Politikfeld gelten, da hier Veränderungen von Traditionen und Lebensentwürfen angeregt werden, die traditionell als persönliche Entscheidungen und private Überzeugungen gelten. In diesem Artikel geht es um einen Aspekt dieses Zusammenspiels von unterschiedlichen Dynamiken der Vor-Beitrittsphase, indem die Möglichkeiten einer aktiven Teilnahme an diesen Prozessen und der Beeinflussung des stattfindenden Wandels durch nationale Genderakteurinnen im Rahmen ihrer Arbeit zur Herstellung von Gleichstellung in Kroatien erörtert wird. Mit Hilfe von Expertinneninterviews mit kroatischen Genderexpertinnen aus Politik und Zivilgesellschaft wird zum einen der Frage nachgegangen, welche Bedeutung die Europäisierung für die Expertinnen als günstiges Zeitfenster zur Stärkung ihrer Bemühungen hat und zum anderen, welchen Einfluss diese Expertinnen wiederum auf den Grad und die konkreten Realisierungen der Europäisierung der Gleichstellungspolitik hatten.
Books by Roswitha Kersten-Pejanic
Conference papers and presentations by Roswitha Kersten-Pejanic
The following considerations are based on interviews on the role of language use and different forms of person reference with Croatian feminist and LGBTIQ activists. These interviews shed light on the specific challenges gender-equality activists face when using languages with strict grammatical gender systems, of which Croatian is a characteristic example. Furthermore, this paper alludes to the linguistic alternatives preferred by queer and feminist activism in Croatia, focusing on a range of alternative referential practices and elaborating on the rationale for their use. There are three main strategies of alternative language use in Croatia discussed in the following paper: double reference forms and the slash-variant (such as in profesori i profesorice and profesori/ce), integrating form (profesoricei) and the generic feminine (profesorice).
The analysis of the interview material also leads to the evaluation of the central research question in this paper, i.e., whether, how and to what extent language use is significant for feminist and LGBTIQ activism in the current post-Yugoslav context. To tackle this question, the paper studies accounts on language use provided by Croatian civil society activists fighting for gender equality, women’s issues and for the acceptance of non-normative sexual and gender identities – namely: Lesbian-Gay-Bi-Trans-Inter-Queer (LGBTIQ) rights. The theoretical framework for this analysis is Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of heretical discourse as a counter impulse against a given order and Michael Halliday’s account of anti-languages as both a tool for and a sign of assuming a critical stance on established world order.
Highlights:
- Strong and unavoidable features of grammatical gender pose a problem to gender-fair language use in person reference, especially the linguistic practice of using the masculine word forms to refer to people generically (false generics)
- Feminist and LGBT activists in Croatia produce and use creative alternative referential practices to avoid the usage of masculines as supposedly gender-neutral in politically engaged language use
Keywords:
Alternative referential practices, linguistic norms, false generics, heretical discourse, anti-language
masculine form of the word. Prescriptive Croatian linguists also tend to recommend the use of feminine forms when indexing women, while strongly supporting the use of the masculine as generic naming practice (cf. Babić 2006; and the survey in Glovacki-Bernardi 2012). Correspondingly, there are no strong calls from people concerned about gender-fair language use (cf. Kersten-Pejanić 2017, 231–281) in favor of the strategy of gender-neutralization (cf. Hellinger & Pauwels 2007, 663) in Croatia. Instead, Croatian speakers concerned about gender fair language use mainly opt for the second strategy of feminist language reforms: feminization.
krajobrazima lijepo su mogli pokazati kako su gradovi puni jezičnih znakova kao i da se zapravo i u hijerarhijama i u različitim funkcijama pojedinih jezika dobro mogu zapaziti vladajući diskursi, dominantne norme i vrijednosti jednoga određenog prostora. Međutim, ovdje predstavljeni planovi i prvi rezultati mog istraživačkog projekta pokazuju kako i pretežno jednojezična i ruralna područja mogu poslužiti kao teren za skorašnje istraživanje koje će biti provedeno u okviru interdisciplinarnog pristupa poznatog kao Linguistic Landscape Studies (LLS). S fokusom na pitanja postkonfliktnog statusa određenih
prostora, bivša ratna područja u Hrvatskoj pokazuju nam kako se relacije između jezika i prostora vidljivo mogu manifestirati u krajobrazu. Štoviše, vidi se i kako jezični i semiotički znakovi mogu poslužiti i kao rezultat i kao izvor trajnog i upornog (hladnog) konflikta utemeljenog na narodnostima regionalnih skupina.
The EU has established dominant models regarding social matters, one of which is gender equality. In the phase prior to accession of a given country to the EU, adapting the current dominant model of a political field often constitutes a matter of fulfilling the conditions for actually becoming a member state. Hence, the pre-accession period is a high point regarding a country’s transformation in matters of policies and polities as well as dominant models, discourses and standards, and can be a time of substantial change in belief systems. Gender equality makes up for a notably contested field of social politics, as it is often aimed at changing traditions and orders of social life, traditionally perceived as personal choices and private convictions. This paper is concerned with one aspect of the interplay of these pre-accession features, namely, the possibility of agency for domestic gender experts pushing for changes in the gender equality order of Croatia. In search for such agency, expert interviews have been conducted with political gender actors and members of feminist organisations of Croatian civil society. These interviews provide an insight into the experiences of experts with the Europeanisation of Croatian gender equality standards, and show some aspects of their specific role in the realisation of the relevant provisions
Zusammenfassung:
Die EU setzt Standards in unterschiedlichen Fragen der Sozialpolitik, und damit auch auf dem Gebiet der Gleichstellungspolitik. In der Zeitspanne vor dem Beitritt eines Landes zur EU bedeutet die Übernahme der aktuellen EU Standards eines Politikfeldes zunächst einmal die Erfüllung der von der EU vorgegebenen Beitrittsbedingungen. Entsprechend ist diese Vor-Beitrittsphase eine wichtige Zeit der Anpassung und Transformation in Bezug auf politische Vorgaben und Gesetze, und darüber hinaus von politischen Standards und gesellschaftlichen Diskursen. Somit hat gerade diese Phase des EU-Beitritts das Potential, bedeutende Wandel von Vorstellungen und Meinungsbildern zu begünstigen. Gerade die Gleichstellungspolitik kann als hochgradig umkämpftes Politikfeld gelten, da hier Veränderungen von Traditionen und Lebensentwürfen angeregt werden, die traditionell als persönliche Entscheidungen und private Überzeugungen gelten. In diesem Artikel geht es um einen Aspekt dieses Zusammenspiels von unterschiedlichen Dynamiken der Vor-Beitrittsphase, indem die Möglichkeiten einer aktiven Teilnahme an diesen Prozessen und der Beeinflussung des stattfindenden Wandels durch nationale Genderakteurinnen im Rahmen ihrer Arbeit zur Herstellung von Gleichstellung in Kroatien erörtert wird. Mit Hilfe von Expertinneninterviews mit kroatischen Genderexpertinnen aus Politik und Zivilgesellschaft wird zum einen der Frage nachgegangen, welche Bedeutung die Europäisierung für die Expertinnen als günstiges Zeitfenster zur Stärkung ihrer Bemühungen hat und zum anderen, welchen Einfluss diese Expertinnen wiederum auf den Grad und die konkreten Realisierungen der Europäisierung der Gleichstellungspolitik hatten.