Bosnian War

Period
Events
Pre
WWI

WWI

WWII

Post
WWII

1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

19962005

2006present

Ottoman Empire rule changes ethno-religious composition

Austro-Hungarian rule
Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian Serb, assassinates Archduke Frantz Ferdinand, beginning WWI
1918Bosnia-Herzegovina becomes part of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes
Annexed to Croatia (pro-Nazi); Jews, Roma, and Serbs sent to camps
Incorporated at end of war into Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia
Provinces delineated along ethnic lines; Ethno-religious tensions
Mandate of full employment
US pressure in favor of capitalism (particularly during Reagan era)
Death of Tito weakens Communism
Slobodan Milosevic in power
Anti-bureaucratic Revolution
Collapse of Communism
Coalition governmentSerbs want to stay in Yugoslavia, Muslims want an independent
Bosnia, and Croats want independent Croatia
Radovan Karadzic
Slobodan MilosevicKardorodevo Agreement
Muslims and Croats form alliance
War; includes ethnic cleansing of Muslims and Croats in Serb-dominated areas and
ethnic cleansing of Serbs in Muslim and Croat-dominated areas
Muslim and Croat men detained in concentration camps
Siege of Sarajevo by Serbs
Fighting between Croats and Muslims
Destruction of Old Bridge
Multiple alliances: Croats and Serbs allied in central region, Muslims and Serbs in
Herzegovina, Muslim in-fighting
UN safe havens for Bosnian Muslims: Gorade, Srebrenica, and Sarajevo
Lasva Valley ethnic cleansing by Croats against Muslims, including massacres and rape
Markale Massacre
End of war between Croats and Muslims
Beginning of active NATO involvement
UN calls in airstrikes to protect Gorade; UN personnel taken hostage by Serbs
US lifts arms embargo
Fall of Srebrenica; massacre of men and male children; UN troops present
NATO air strikes against Serbs
Dayton Peace Accord
International Criminal Tribunal in the Hague
War crimes convictions of Croats and Muslims
Serb General Krstic guilty of genocide
Expulsion of Serb nationalist party members
Old Bridge rebuilt
Srebrenica Trial
Throughout late 90s and early 00s, various Serb military leaders arrested

Bosnian War
Casualties: 200,000 killed; 30,000-50,000 women raped
Symbols
and Motifs

Concerns

Themes

Theoretical
Dimensions

Veil
Interior of homes
Religious iconography
Black and white
Men
Roads
Shelled buildings
City v. Village/rural
Clash of religions
Identity and national borders
Western products and values
Gender and Sex
How differences between men and women are constructed in religious versus
secular arenas
Naturalization of character as determined by biology
National Borders
Who owns the land and the resources?
How is a nation formed?
The use of media
What images are shown versus repressed
Illusion of access
Western media coverage as constructing a negative image of Middle Eastern
peoples
History of conquest
The right of people to self-determination
Globalization and its discontents
a stabilized and centralized viewpoint on globalization as the drama of the
Western subject and its sufferings (Mirzoeff)
The winners and losers in the global economy
The value of survivor narratives
Who counts as a survivor?
What individual narratives claim about extremity, about human experience,
about human morality
Who owns the narrative?
Religious Identity
Freedom of practice
Ethnic versus religious divides
Historical hostility
Ethnicity conflated with religion
Benedict Andersonnations as imagined communities
Agamben: Homo sacer; stripping away successive layers of personhood
Greenspan: The tellable versus the hearable
Hilberg: Perpetrators, victims, and bystanders
Psychological damageparticularly in terms of trauma theory

Bosnian War

Massumiconsequences of saturation of social space by fear