Legenda o dedi i Jaffa keksu

Abstract

Urbana legenda o događaju u beogradskom parku u kojoj mlada osoba greškom jede keks koji pripada starcu s kojim deli klupu, predstavlja transformaciju urbane legende koja se u britanskoj varijanti odnosi na stariju Britanku i mlađeg useljenika, da bi se nacionalnost menjala u verzijama širom Evrope. Pre transformacije u Srbiji legenda je doživela i depolitizaciju svodeći aktere na dvoje ljudi u cilju pedagoške i moralno-religijske propagande. U Srbiji starosne karakteristike su zamenile mesta, a poruka legende proizlazi iz specifične podele na Miloševićevu i 'Drugu Srbiju' nastale u poslednjoj deceniji dvadesetog veka. U oba slučaja legenda propoveda adaptaciju i asimilaciju saopštavajući da 'drugi' mogu naučiti da budu kao 'mi', što im garantuje prestanak položaja 'drugog'.

The urban legend that tells of how a young person ate by mistake some biscuits belonging to an old man sitting on the same bench in a Belgrade park is a transformation of an urban legend whose British version features an elderly British lady and a young immigrant, and which can be found throughout Europe, involving protagonists of various nationalities. Before undergoing transformation in Serbia, the legend was depoliticized, reducing the protagonists to two persons for the purposes of moral instruction and moral-religious propaganda. In Serbia, the age of the two protagonists has been reversed, while the moral of the story derives from the specific 1990s distinction between Slobodan Milošević's Serbia and 'the Other Serbia'. In both cases, the legend propagates the idea of adaptation and assimilation, suggesting that 'others' can learn to be like 'us', which ensures that they are no longer in the position of 'the other'.