LIGHT ON Bliki

In 2011 the left-wing party Positive Slovenia (PS) won the parliamentary elections (the party was under the leadship of Zoran Janković who is of Serbian origin) and the Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS) claimed that they were elected under the pressure of “trenerkarji”, the so called »new citizens« and »citizens of Serbian origin«. The term was used by the populist Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS) to describe the second and third generation of migrants from former Yugoslavia. “Trenerkarji” literally means those who are wearing sports clothes. It is a stereotypical image of young migrants (born in Slovenia) who allegedly wear sports clothes to any occasion. Thus on 13 December 2011, in his column on the SDS website (http://www.sds.si/news/10328) Tomaž Majer described the structure of a typical voter of Zoran Janković, calling them “trenerkarji”. He claimed they were wearing sport clothes when casting the vote, and had a number inscribed with a pen on their hands, so they knew which number they had to vote for (the number for Zoran Janković). Besides the sports clothes and numbers written on their hands, they were constructed as “new citizens” and “voters with foreign accent” or voters who did not “open their mouth” coming to vote in groups of 10 or more. There was a lot of speculation in the media that Tomaž Majer does not exist at all. It is rather a fake name taken by Janez Janša and his PR team.

The phenomenon of “trenerkarji” is the last attempt of populist interpretations, which played on the existing xenophobia in Slovenian. It has been a part of a long lasting process of “othering” of people coming from former republics of Yugoslavia. The process has started already in the late eighties, but has intensified especially in the early nineties when Slovenia got its independence. The message constructs a hierarchy of voters/citizens who are not of Slovenian origins and therefore represent a threat for Slovenia and Slovene elections, which were kidnapped by Serbian / southerner voters. In such a way “trenerkarji” were constructed as those who endanger true Slovenians, who are not political, but went to vote for Zoran Janković as he is one of them (i.e. Serbian). Furthermore, they were constructed as not very cleaver as they could not even remember the number they had to vote for, thus having it written on their hands.

Termillä viitataan serbialaistaustaisiin, Sloveniassa syntyneisiin ihmisiin, ja sen avulla ihmisiä pyritään erottelemaan syntyperän perusteella. Termi leimaa serbialaistaustaiset tyhmiksi ja poliittisesti väärää mieltä oleviksi.

A „tréningruhások” kifejezés a korábbi jugoszláv tagköztársaságokból érkezett emberek idegenként és nem túl intelligens emberként való megjelenítésére szolgál.

L’idea di popolazioni di immigrati riconoscibili dal fatto di indossare abiti e tute sportive è una tra le più recenti interpretazioni della xenofobia in Slovenia. Fa parte di un processo di "Creazione dell'altro" (di gruppi diversi) per le persone provenienti dall’ex repubblica della Jugoslavia. I “trenerkarji” sono “costruiti” come persone non molto intelligenti.

Poustvarjanje “drugih”, ki prihajajo iz bivših jugoslovanskih republik. “Trenirkarji” so konstruirani kot ne preveč pametni.

Slovenian Democratic Party official website: http://www.sds.si/news/10328