Elinor Despalatovic

Professor Despalatovic retired from Connecticut College in 2001.

At the time of her retirement, Elinor Despalatovic was working on a monograph about peasant life in Croatia-Slavonia before World War I. Much of her material comes from a rich and relatively unknown collection of village studies made at that time for the Ethnographic Department of the Yugoslav Academy. The village studies were based upon a long questionnaire drawn up by Ante Radic which examines material culture, customs and beliefs. She was also working on the history of the Croatian Peasant Party, the most important political party in Croatia in the interwar period. She is particularly interested in the economic and literary organizations affiliated with the Croatian Peasant Party (Gospodarska sloga, Seljacka sloga), and the lives of its founders and leaders: Ante and Stjepan Radic, and Vlatko Macek.

Professor Despalatovic has published articles on Peasant Party topics.

Before her retirement, she taught Russian History, Soviet History, Eastern Europe Between the Great Powers, 1815-1990, History of the Balkans since 1453, and various seminars on peasant, Soviet and Balkan history.