Being philosopher in Serbia

This is the twentieth installment of The Cocoon Goes Global, a series that gives a sense of what the philosophy profession looks like outside of the Anglophone West.

This guest post is written by  Ljiljana Radenovic, who is Associate Professor at the Department of Philosophy, University of Belgrade. Her main research interests fall into the field of philosophy and history of cognitive science, philosophy of psychology, history of emotions, and developmental psychology.

Let me start with a couple of words about myself. I did my undergraduate degree in Belgrade, Serbia. I continued graduate studies at York University in Toronto, Canada where I got my degree. Before landing an academic job in Belgrade and returning to Serbia I kept applying to a number of North American teaching jobs and I experienced the dread of job interviews at the Eastern APA. I was lucky enough to get one two-year postdoc and some courses to teach at York University after my PhD defense. In what follows I will do my best to highlight the most striking similarities and differences between life of an academic philosopher in North America and the one in Serbia.

A few words about the country

Serbia is a small country of about seven million people on the Balkan peninsula. In the twentieth century it was part of Yugoslavia, a socialist country that was not a member of the Soviet Eastern Block. Yugoslavia broke to pieces in the wars of the 1990s. Nowadays, some twenty years later the impact of the wars is still felt. The economy never sufficiently recovered while the country’s progress to become a member of the European Union is at a stand-still with many obstacles still ahead. But living in a country in the Balkans has its own advantages. The general mood is relaxed even among academics. People,  including philosophy professors, are willing to go for a coffee at a very short notice. There is no need to plan social events many weeks ahead. In fact, such events spontaneously happen every day in one of the local cafes near departmental building.

Job market

Serbia has three major departments of philosophy, at three different Universities: Belgrade, Novi Sad, and Niš. The only official teaching language at the undergraduate level is Serbian, so jobs are not advertized internationally. Although Serbia is not a big country and philosophy is not a big discipline the market is still tight. There are essentially new job openings only when a full professor retires. In Serbia retirement is mandatory so at least occasionally there is an open spot for a younger academic.

The road to tenure is long. To get a tenure you need to be a full professor and it takes 10 years to get there. So, the position of an associate professor does not provide unconditional job security. However, once you get a job at the level of an assistant professor, unless there is some major upheaval, it is expected that you go more or less smoothly from assistant to full professorship. Still, in order to do that you need a number of publications, administrative duties, and excellence in teaching demonstrated at every level. There is also an option to renew the contract at the level of assistant or associate professor, but such renewal prolongs the road to tenure for additional 5 or more years.

Teaching

Once you get a job the course load is light (2+2). The Fall term starts on October 1^st and ends right before New Year’s holidays. This is possible because Serbian Christmas is celebrated according to the Julian calendar and falls on January 7^th. The spring term starts in late February and runs to the end of May. There is no summer term in Serbia.

The major difference between North American and Serbian system is in the way the finals are organized. Typically, in North America if the course has the final exam as one of the components of the grade the student must take the final exam right after the term in order to pass the course. In Serbia the finals are organized throughout the year at six different exam periods (mid January, mid February, mid June, early July, late August, mid September). Students are allowed to take the final exam even a year or two (depending on the course requirements) after they took the course.

Research and philosophy traditions

Given the light course load there is plenty of time for research, but the pressure to publish is not as big as in North America. Beside the international journals that we can submit our work to there are several local philosophy journals among which Belgrade Philosophical Annual (http://www.f.bg.ac.rs/bpa/) has been steadily gaining internationally visibility.

The philosophical areas that philosophers at the department cover are not that different from those at the average North American University. So, we have scholars working on various topics in the history of philosophy as well as ethics, esthetics, political philosophy, epistemology, philosophy of science, and logic. About one third of active members of the Department of philosophy at the University of Belgrade obtained their PhD internationally (in US, Canada, France, Germany, or Australia). The rest obtained their PhD either in Belgrade or in Novi Sad. During the days of socialism many philosophers were working within Marxist paradigm, but since 1970s they diversified. At some point department in Belgrade was especially strong and internationally recognized in logic.

When I was an undergraduate student at the same department in the 1990s, once Yugoslavia started falling apart, Marxism was already in the decline while the analytic/continental divide was emerging. Today, the majority of my colleagues at the Department of Philosophy in Belgrade work within analytic tradition, many publishing their work regularly in major philosophy journals. By contrast, the Department of Philosophy in Novi Sad focuses more on the continental tradition.  

Finally, until this year when COVID19 spoiled most of our plans the departmental philosophical life has been lively with many international speakers regularly coming for a visit and giving talks in the springtime. Also, a number of international conferences have been held in Belgrade including the graduate one that has by now become a traditional event. When things are back to normal we are looking forward to seeing many of you here discussing philosophy over coffee or beer in one of our famous patios.

Comments

[Stojkovic]

Thanks for the information. I spent time working in another Balkan country and would love the chance to return.
One piece of information that might be useful here would be where the jobs are advertized when they do come up. How would someone outside Serbia go about finding these jobs?
Thanks again...

[Elventofler]

I wonder if phenomenology is part of your thinking and research