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Counting citizens: the transfer and translation of census categories from the international statistical congresses to the principality of Bulgaria (1872–1888)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Gayle Lonergan Open the ORCID record for Gayle Lonergan [Opens in a new window]
Gayle Lonergan*
Affiliation:
The Centre for Historical Research, Higher School of Economics, St. Petersburg, Russia
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*Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

This paper examines the nineteenth-century census as an early information technology and a medium for the transnational exchange of ideas in the nineteenth century. In particular, it considers how the ideas discussed by the International Statistical Congresses were directly applied in the newly established kingdom of Bulgaria in the first censuses from 1881 to 1888. It then examines how the legacy of Ottoman rule and the categories of the nineteenth-century Ottoman censuses unconsciously influenced the first census of Bulgaria, despite the desire of the new rulers to mark a significant break with the past. It also demonstrates how the nationalist feeling in the multiethnic former territory of the Ottoman Empire influenced the seemingly neutral categories of the first census. These categories then began to produce an implicit representation of the ideal Bulgarian citizen and so started the process of exclusion of the Turkish-speaking or Muslim population from full membership of the new body politic.

Keywords

BulgariaInternational Statistical Congresscensusnational identityethnicityminoritiesTurks
Type
Research Article
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 46 , Issue 4: Special Section: Classification , July 2018 , pp. 556 - 574
Copyright
Copyright © 2018 Association for the Study of Nationalities 

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