Does Slovenia belong to the Balkan

[Hurrem sultana]

Who's 'the rest of us' in your post?

who do you think?

[Loddfafner]

Wikipedia does not support me on this, but I recall reading that the Slovene language is only classified as South Slavic due to its location, but it is actually closer to Czech. The few words I learned from phrasebooks reinforced that impression.

When I stopped in Ljubljana after visiting Croatia and Bosnia, I had a sense of returning to Central Europe from Elsewhere. The feel of crowds and parks and people were closer to Prague or Vienna than to Zagreb, Split, or Dubrovnik, much less Mostar. The abundance of subcultural types, kids with mohawks etc, reinforced that impression.

[derLowe]

Undoubetly but so has Croatia.

My point is this, Slovenia has been together with Austria longer than it has with the rest of the southern Slavs. It stands to reason that culturally it cannot be similar to the other Balkan countries.

Ultimately we need a Slovenian to voice his opinion on this, not a half/Istrian like me.

But many Slovenian nationalists dream of Carantania and
claim that Southern Styria and Carinthia should be part of
Slovenia because they were the first settlers igoing back to the
7th century of
this region. So thats a double edged sword.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carantania

Regretfully, that just proves that some Slovenians are more Balkan than they care to admit.

[Lena]

who do you think?

If I wanted to guess I wouldn't ask you to define 'us'.

[GeistFaust]

I would say they are not part of the Balkans anymore than Slovakia, Hungary, or Romania is. They are in a transitional zone between the Romance(Mediterranean), Germanic, and Slavic worlds.


I think they fit more into the Central European zone, which excludes them from being in the North Balkans, which is in the periphery of the Central European zone.


I also think their mentality and culture tends to not reflect a Balkan like structure, which I find to be uniquely associated with peoples like the Serbs, Croats, Albanians, Ect. I think though it has been said that once you start moving East and South of Vienna the more Balkan like it becomes.

[Hurrem sultana]

If I wanted to guess I wouldn't ask you to define 'us'.

Balkanians

[Lena]

Regretfully, that just proves that some Slovenians are more Balkan than they care to admit.

Slovenes are very pragmatic bunch of people; they don't suffer from inferiority complex, thus it's on a personal level how one feels about the Balkan region and all that goes with it.

[derLowe]

Slovenes are very pragmatic bunch of people; they don't suffer from inferiority complex, thus it's on a personal level how one feels about the Balkan region and all that goes with it.

I will attest to them being pragmatic.

[Lena]

Balkanians

As I stated, I know quite a lot of Slovenes (some very close friends in RL) and I never sensed any cultural gaps between us.

[Azalea]

To me.. Slovenia is a part of Central Europe. When I think of the Balkan I think of Croatia, Bosnian, Serbia, Bulgaria, Albania, Kosovo and Greece.