The Balkan gurbet/pečalbarstvo - past and present

• Main Author: Hristov Petko
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Institute of Ethnography, SASA, Belgrade 2015-01-01
• Series: Glasnik Etnografskog Instituta SANU
• Subjects: migrations; labour mobility; gender; gurbet; pečalbarstvo; Šopluk
• Online Access: http://www.doiserbia.nb.rs/img/doi/0350-0861/2015/0350-08611503551H.pdf

The article presents an observation on the various traditional forms of cross-border seasonal labour mobility on the Balkans, both as agricultural works away from the home place, and as large-scale temporary craftsmen’s migrations of builders, bakers, dairy workers, confectioners and so on. In countries like Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Macedonia and Serbia, traditional cultural models of trans-border labour mobility that encompasses the majority of the male population of entire regions have existed for centuries. These migrant groups created the specific subculture of gurbet, which the men carried with them in the big city, at the same time altering the entire model of traditional culture in their home regions. The annual journeys of men from the various mountain parts of the Balkans “at work” and “for gain” (pečalba) in the course of the years developed specific features of the feast-ritual system and folklore in the villages of these regions. At the same time, the traditional Balkan gurbet is an important condition for mutual penetration between various cultures and peoples and for creating new cultural patterns and various multidimentional identities.