"They call themselves Macedonians"

[makedonche]

Here is a lovely story i just heard.

(Admin...you may move it if you find it to be inappropriate in this thread)
But it is a modern day story of "They call themselves Macedonian"

A man that i know of, was a typical mixed up Macedonian who you would label a Grkoman. He just came back from a trip to Egejska Makedonia, which before that, he spent 30 odd years of living in Australia and not being back since.

Sources tell me, he has all of a sudden, since coming back, become a die hard Macedonian, a patriotec.

I wander what, on his trip to Egej, would have woken him up? are the people in that part of Macedonia finally seeing the light and its rubbed off on him? i wander.

I will try to investigate in future, i am fascinated with this good news. Praise the Lord

Bill77
Interesting story, i await your follow up on this. If it turns out that the Egejski are awakening their Macedonian roots then we may have to start a fundraising campaign to send all of the ROM politicians there until they too wake up to themselves!

[Bill77]

Here is a lovely story i just heard.

(Admin...you may move it if you find it to be inappropriate in this thread)
But it is a modern day story of "They call themselves Macedonian"

A man that i know of, was a typical mixed up Macedonian who you would label a Grkoman. He just came back from a trip to Egejska Makedonia, which before that, he spent 30 odd years of living in Australia and not being back since.

Sources tell me, he has all of a sudden, since coming back, become a die hard Macedonian, a patriotec.

I wander what, on his trip to Egej, would have woken him up? are the people in that part of Macedonia finally seeing the light and its rubbed off on him? i wander.

I will try to investigate in future, i am fascinated with this good news. Praise the Lord

[Pelister]

1871

Petko Slaveykov

We have heard it many times from the Macedonians that they are not Bulgarians, rather that they are Macednoians ...

Source: Published by Petko Slaveykov, in January 1871 in a newspaper published in Constantinople titled 'Macedonia'. This excellent document was posted at MTO by Daskalot. It can be found here:

http://www.macedoniantruth.org/forum/showthread.php?t=1797&highlight=Slaveikov

2009

In 2009 the 'Euromazaik' project for the study of minority languages surveyed and documented minority languages in Greece. The study concluded that Macedonian was spoken in 360 villages in northern Greece.

The report noted that:

The people who speak this language in the central and western part of the Greek part of Macedonia call themselves and their langauge 'Macedonian'.

Source: Deutche Welle, Europe, 15.08.2009 'Study on the use of Macedonian language in Greece', DW-WORLD.DE, 'Euromozaik Project for the study of Minority Languages'.

[Pelister]

One part of it says: who taught you to answer that you're Macedonian? And the response was "my mother".

Another part I think says, 'You, child, what are you?', "I am a Macedonian'.

[Soldier of Macedon]

One part of it says: who taught you to answer that you're Macedonian? And the response was "my mother".

[Pelister]

The Macedonians were 'buried' in history under false labels.

[Pelister]

Thanks, Bratot. Although I can read some of it, and get the general idea of what is happening, I would struggle understanding that page, without a proper translation into English, and the information in it could not be useful in an English book, unless and correct and accurate translation was made.

[Bratot]

Returning to the year 1919. The head of the French mission in Macedonia, Major Bernar, toured the Belamorska region of Macedonia (under Greek occupation) talking to the indigenous population. In his report he noted that:



Source: Cited in A. Donski 'The Descendants of Alexander the Great of Macedonia, Part One - Folklore, Macedonian Literary Association 'Grigor Prlichev', Sydney, p.28

Original Source: Veritas, "Macedonia under the Yoke, Documents", Sofia, 1931, Published in Bulgarian

Very important example from this book as well:


The book is full of propaganda but there few things they missed, like this one.

Here is digitalized version:

http://www.dlib.mk:8080/jspui/html/68275/225/87470602.html#/22

[Pelister]

"They call themselves Macedonians"

Returning to the year 1919. The head of the French mission in Macedonia, Major Bernar, toured the Belamorska region of Macedonia (under Greek occupation) talking to the indigenous population. In his report he noted that:

"In the part of Macedonia now subject to Greek rule the language of the current ruling authority is barely understood in the country ... When you ask the people what their nationality is they almost always reply 'We are Macedonians'!"

Source: Cited in A. Donski 'The Descendants of Alexander the Great of Macedonia, Part One - Folklore, Macedonian Literary Association 'Grigor Prlichev', Sydney, p.28

Original Source: Veritas, "Macedonia under the Yoke, Documents", Sofia, 1931, Published in Bulgarian

[Bratot]

http://books.google.com/books?id=qDduhCXNhi0C&printsec=frontcover&dq=history+balkans+greece+serbia+bulgaria#v=onepage&q&f=false

The Green underlined text:

"Играта беше водена преку соодветните медиуми на црквите и училиштата, за несреќните македонски селани да бидат пред се' просветени што се однесува на тоа кои тие биле, или поточно речено за кого им било кажано дека треба да се сметаат себеси,.."

[Pelister]

You could probably add to that in the literally thousands of accounts, anthologies of Macedonian folklore - there is not a single reference to 'Slavs'.

The only time the reference 'Slav' appears in relation to the inhabitants of Macedonia, is when foriegners are describing the place and its people.

The term 'Slav' is a foriegn imposition, and so is its 'history'. Its not how Macedonians historically described or defined themselves. The application of this term is part of the conquest of our territory, by invading regimes and the theft of our name, and cultural symbols.

[George S.]

Well we can thank the propaganda machine from the bulgars to the greeks.The greeks with their slavophone references etc.Not to mention our own people who kept emphasising our slav background.Onece something is smeared lomg enough it remains a stain.Like mud it sticks,.From the beginning we shouls allways refer to ourselves only as macedonians.

[TRAVOLTA]

Very interesting is last paragraph........

http://www.archive.org/stream/macedo...ge/n0/mode/2up

[Pelister]

I just wanted to say a few things about the evidence here.

Over the last 150 years or so, Western politicians, academics and the public more generally have been interacting almost entirely with the colonial representations of the Macedonian people. These are basically non-Macedonian representations of the Macedonians, coming from regimes that have been traditionally hostile to the indigenous population.

The 'colonial narratives' I am referring to here are entirely foreign to Macedonia, and overwhelmingly Greek-centric or Bulgarian-centric in their approach. They deny the existence of a distinctive ethnic group, who have always called themselves Macedonians, and avoid any attempt to understand the occupied territories from the perspective of the traditional land holders - the Macedonians.

For probably about the last 150 years, the 'Greeks' (and other foreigners) have been exporting their particular ‘representations’ of the land and the Macedonian people to Europe. These representations have entirely dominated the discourse on all things 'Macedonian' in Europe and beyond, while the Macedonians were being buried on the battle field. Again, these are non-Macedonian representations of the Macedonians that inform the West; the representations are coming from regimes that have seized the territory by force, and ruthlessly suppressed its indigenous population. They objectify the Macedonians and employ a colorful array of colonial terms to ‘hide’ them, or simply misrepresent them in order to 'convince' the West that the Macedonian do not exist, or should not. The propaganda is particularly influential with Western politicians (notably in Australia but else where too) and academics, who may not be aware of the local realities. Once again, we never actually here from the indigenous Macedonians themselves, and when we do it is distorted.

This had led to the erroneous belief in the West that there are no distinctive indigenous Macedonians. There are many variations on this colonial theme. The Macedonian 'space' has been opened up through this kind of propaganda to the interpretive mischief, and conquest of invaders and colonisers, who in more recent times have assumed the identity of the 'Macedonians'. Most notably the invading 'Greeks' and Bulgarians. Again, the indigenous Macedonian people have entirely disappeared from the story. The fact is this distinctive ethnic group have always 'called themselves Macedonians'. It is about time that the West realise that the invading 'Greeks' have no legitimate historical claim to occupy Macedonian territory, or steal the name.

By focusing on Macedonian perspectives, historians will be treating the Macedonian peoples as the primary voice or agents of the historical inquiry, rather than as objects to be exterminated, renamed as 'Slavs' or something else.

[Pelister]

"They call themselves Macedonians"

In 1900, the Russian 'Slavist' Petar Draganov was commenting on Russian imperial policy, and the balkans.

"Should the Russians be happy or sad because in Macedonia the indigenous population, who call themselves Macedonians by the old name, are raising their voices? According to our personal opinion it would be just to give at least moral support to this numerous tribe that speaks a separate Slavic dialect and has its own history, not less interesting than the history of the Bulgarians and the Serbs..."

Cited in Aleksandar Donski, The Descendants of Alexander the Great of Macedon: The Arguments and Evidence that today's Macedonians are descendants of the ancient Macedonians (part one - folklore elements), Macedonian Literary Association 'Grigor Prlichev', Sydney, 2004, p.231