Dragomir Bondžić, SERBIAN INTELLECTUAL ELITE IN 1941

DOI 10.29362/2589.bon.171-192

The paper gives an overview of the activities of the Serbian intellectual elite during 1941, on the eve of the April War and at the beginning of the occupation. Teachers of the University of Belgrade and members of the Serbian Royal Academy, two key scientific and national institutions, are viewed as the intellectual elite. The attitudes, behavior, and destinies of Serbian intellectuals during 1941 were varied. Among them were individuals who had already played a role in the events at the end of March 1941, as well as those who had taken part in the short-lived April War. Some then found themselves in German captivity, and some in exile. Most of them remained in occupied Belgrade. Some of them supported the German occupational apparatus, while others resisted and took part in the uprising in the summer of 1941. Most of them faced difficult war conditions, propaganda pressure and police repression. In the fall of 1941, dozens of intellectuals were imprisoned in the Banjica camp and released only after the uprising in Serbia was quelled.