Croatianess and Children’s Popular Culture

Abstract

This paper examines the discursive formation of Croatianness (hrvatstvo) during the Croatian War of Independence in the 1990s and the post-war era, focusing mainly on the domain of popular culture. In this analysis of Croatian children’s popular culture, the main emphasis is on chocolate bar stickers and sticker albums manufactured by Kraš. At the time, the company had published Cro-Army chocolate stickers and the accompanying Croatian army sticker album, Knights’ Tales, about Croatian history and various historical events, and Maki, a sticker album of Catholic saints. In relying on theoretical and methodological frameworks of representational and discourse theory regarding national identity and fantasy, this paper shows one of the ways in which Croatianness was formed in children’s popular culture through three main aspects – war, history, and religion