Kosovar

The term is used in a very Kosovar inconsistent terminology. After a controversial definition of the term includes all inhabitants of Kosovo, regardless of their respective ethnicity, and should thus represent a geographical designation. Another controversial definition used to refer to the Kosovars Kosovo Albanians. One criticism against the predominantly used in Western media called " Kosovars " aims that the population in Kosovo still frequently preferred self- descriptions such as Albanian, Serbian, Roma, Turk, and the like. Kosovar is the nationality specified in the passports of the Republic of Kosovo.

Morphology

The word " Kosovar " is formed from the Slavic toponym Kosov and the very productive in Albanian suffix -ar, which always refers to people.

Conceptual history

For the first time the term appeared in the early 20s. At that time, tens of thousands of refugees from Kosovo held on in Albania. Their political leaders formed their own group in parliament - the Kosovars. The longer stopped the splitting of the Albanian settlement area, the more the term Kosovar Albanian language use in a naturalized.

As a self-designation to find the term for the first time in 1942 in the subtitle to a study published by the partisans weekly. As such was and is among the Kosovar Kosovo Albanians but controversial. After the change of the Yugoslav constitution of 1974 the autonomy rights of the Serbian province of Kosovo within the Yugoslav Republic of Serbia and thus within the Yugoslav Federal Republic of fact - except for the right of secession - had risen to the level of a Yugoslav republic, was among the Albanian intellectuals increasingly on ethnic identity of one's own ethnic group debated. Some said, through the decades- long separation from Albania a special Kosovar identity have emerged and therefore one could be described as a Kosovar. At the same time this was a recognition of the political reality in Yugoslavia, not least but would also signals the ambition to be titular of the autonomous province. Others, however, rejected the self-designation of Kosovar because its use would deepen the division of the Albanian nation. Not least because the term was mainly established in Albania, the opponents see it as a plot by the Tosk -dominated communist government of Enver Hoxha in order to divide in this way counter.

With the intensification of the Serb- Albanian conflict at times of Slobodan Milošević, the term Kosovars came into the international media. He was often used as a synonym for " Kosovo Albanians ", so also of western policy peaks such as the German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer and French President Jacques Chirac, the continuing NATO air strikes on Yugoslavia in 1999 with a " cold-bloodedly planned genocide of the Kosovars ' justified by Milošević. Also on the part of German KDOM - observers who were deployed in the conflict in Kosovo to monitor the Kosovo, the term Kosvaren was explicitly declared as " synonym " for " Kosovo Albanians ". Some journalists and the UN transferred the designation on the non-Albanian population of Kosovo. Both the Serbs and other minorities in Kosovo called themselves, however, in the opinion of the former Czechoslovak Minister of Foreign Affairs and UN Balkan expert on human rights issues, Jiří service beer, at least before the Declaration of Independence in 2008 not as Kosovars. Nevertheless, an attempt was made in the western parlance to distinguish the term " Kosovars " as a term for " all the inhabitants of the province of Kosovo " by the ethnically differentiated terms " ethnic Albanians " and " Kosovo Serbs ". In connection with the internationally partially hesitant and still only partially recognized Kosovo declared independence in February 2008, it came in the German press to the formulation that only the voice control with the attribution of the term " Kosovar " in a geographical sense to the entire population of the Kosovo claim to validity own. The Duden gives to the term " Kosovar " only " people of Kosovo ", without clarifying whether this is meant the totality of the inhabitants.

At present it is unclear how the citizens of Kosovo should be named in the two official languages.

Scientific controversy

Diana Johnstone sees its publication in 2000 the use of the term " Kosovar " ( in English form: " Kosovar " Albanian " Kosovar " ) of official western side ( OSCE KVM reports) in the light of political partisanship of the " international community " for the Kosovo Albanian side before and during the NATO attacks on Yugoslavia in 1999. their view, the term " Kosovar " clearly intends giving the impression that Kosovo has always belonged exclusively to its population of Albanian ethnicity and at the Serbs to " invaders " is. From Kosovo Albanian side, the concept of " Kosovar " adopted in the obvious intention of himself, but no other ethnic group to identify with the province of Kosovo. In a similarly biased in the OSCE - KVM in their reporting for the Roma, who were accused of Kosovo Albanians of complicity with the Serbs and treated hostile to both in English as well as the Kosovo Albanians pejoratively connoted term " Gypsy" ( in English form " Gypsies ", Albanian: " Maxhupet " ) is used. To address the conceptual confusion and misunderstanding of the events that struck Johnstone instead of the cumbersome phrase " Kosovo Albanians " the use of the Albanian self-designation " Shqiptar " ( in English known in German so far not in use ), which is not a negative connotation and in contrast to the term " Albanian" ( in English: Albanian ) not national affiliation to Albania implies, but the large amount of people including Albanian ethnic group in Kosovo that does not originate from Kosovo, but from Albania. They complained that it had been decided by Kosovo Albanian side in this situation, that the term " Shqiptar " should not be used from the outside and that this episode was being provided. The use of stated by John Stone's " honorable " concept " Shqiptar " may, however, be objected that " Schiptari " ( šiptari ) is a pejorative term for Albanians Serbo-Croatian.

On the contradictory use of the term " Kosovars " has been repeatedly pointed out in the literature. Noam Chomsky is in this context to the conclusion that contain all the terms misleading connotations. He points out that the term " Kosovars " is often used in the sense of " Kosovar Albanians " and preferred for this use, the term " Kosovo Albanians ".