Contradictory commentaries on Angelina Jolie’s movie In the Land of Blood and Honey stimulated me to watch the movie. It was already clear that Bosnian Muslims liked the movie and that the Great-Serbian nationalists loathed it, but I was particularly intrigued by the affectations of the small-Herzegovinians, who detested the movie in imitation of the Great-Serbs. I was impressed by […]
These are the reasons why it is not possible to define Ivo Andrić’s group identity exclusively by ethno-national standards. For the same reasons, it is, strictly speaking, impossible to define the ethno-national cultures in Bosnia in exclusive terms. The manner in which the ethno-national cultures are recognized as separate and the manner in which they at the same time overlap, […]
Also known as the Bonanski Ovcar Tornjak, this ancient breed has been protecting the flocks of sheep and cattle in Bosnia and Croatia for at least 1,000 years. The word ‘tor’ means a sheep-pen. The earliest written description of this large dog is to be found in the archives of a bishop in the year 1062. It is mentioned again, […]
SANICA … Mujaga Selman, breeder of Bosnian shepherd dogs from Sanica, Bosnia Herzegovina, crowned his long-time breeder’s work with first place in the World Dog Show, held recently in the Polish city of Poznan. Selman’s Bosnian Tornjak named Bilov was declared the most beautiful dog in its competition. This passionate dog breeder said that the award is extremely significant considering […]
Let our neighbors be very angry about our pride in our old name, language, and customs and our outright refusal to embrace their name as a mark of our nationality and language. In their attacks on us our neighbors–to be quite clear, let us call them Jovo and Ivo–are in agreement. But they both are asking from us something else […]
Twilight had come a long time ago. On a stubble field below the village in the mountains, Lujo huddled under his coat. Only his freckled face, with large speckled eyes and locks of blond hair spilling from his forehead, stuck out. A few steps before him grazed Jablan. Every evening in the heat of summer Lujo grazed Jablan late into […]
Above is Polaris And below Venus Over there the Northern wind and yonder the Southern Who’ll tell me where the Path to Love is And where the Path to Death Translated by Keith Doubt © 2011 Keith Doubt
To Milorad Pejić You who are said to have tracked the reindeer’s scent, I couldn’t follow you. Not because, where you live, images are sharp as razors, nor because entering a warm place would dim my sight through fogged up glasses. Not for lack of strength: no one knows where it comes from nor what it is that makes him […]
I read papers when they’re just brought in from outside, from minus 27 degrees, fresh and cold off the presses. From all the morning papers I remember only one self-sustaining article: like the recipe for a simple cake, the list of scientific advances in 2003 was inserted between the ads and Christmas wishes. Glass has been invented that refracts at […]
a child in rubber boots wonders in the underground at the dripping grates holds up his hand to catch an emulsion of machine oil and water tells the rush hour crowd how he captured the sky there’s endless worrying about the simple fact about a stormy season the weather reports indicate showers at more than half probability and the shoulders […]
By Sarajevo there’s a green garden, In that garden there’s a well of cold water, By the well, a marble stone, On the stone, an aged vase, In the vase three flowers bloomed. Were you to give me the three flowers from that garden, A wallflower, a carnation, a red rose, I’d not take the wallflower, nor the carnation, but […]
Irina Lagunina of RFE/RL’s Russian Service spoke to Broz during a recent visit to Sarajevo. Lagunina: You are originally from Belgrade but moved to Sarajevo permanently after the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Why did you decide to move? Svetlana Broz: I lived in Belgrade, which was a European metropolis 30 years ago. But unfortunately in the meantime, due to the politics […]
Dear Professor Chomsky, My name is Midhat Ridjanović. I am professor emeritus of English and linguistics at the University of Sarajevo. I came to the United States in the fall of 1966 on a Fulbright fellowship to do graduate work in linguistics at the University of Michigan and, in 1967, obtained a Master’s degree. Thanks to a Prize Scholarship from […]
To Milorad Pejić I get out of bed – the first step into a new day and the body is flooded with sorrow the very moment it touches the ground, it shakes and whimpers like a plane touching down on a sunny winter afternoon, when kissed by its own shadow. Translated from the Bosnian by Wayles Browne © 2011 Wayles […]
Courting, oh that courting! Is there anything more ideal and pleasant than courting? Those times when a man in his adolescence would sacrifice days and nights for a single look of his beloved, the times when he did not have any other wish but to see the queen of his heart or hear her sweet words, can never be forgotten. […]
The creation of a new social order and the establishment of different social relations brought through the arrival of the Turks in Bosnia resulted in the symbiosis of the pre-established and the imported cultures and influences. This process of symbiosis was facilitated due to two reasons: First, the government did not strive to destroy the situation they encountered and, second, […]
From April 1992 to the end of 1995, at the University of Sarajevo, there was no scoring, no grade percentages, no Bologna Process evaluations, no debating, no PowerPoint presentations, and no URL references in bibliographies. During the war, we used pens and old notebooks. An old typewriter and an improvised wick lantern were indispensable for writing term papers and essays. […]
Introduction Bosnia and Herzegovina has been the central focus of the Serbian national project, not merely during the 1990s, but throughout the twentieth century. Serbia’s aspirations in BiH since the 1990s’ wars have remained consistent, and include the phased assimilation of Republika Srpska (RS). A section of the Serbian elite takes the firm position that “there is today no more […]
I’ve been wondering how woefully few junkies and alcoholics there are amidst NPR’s contemporary American poets, even how few just plain smokers, and how woefully many non-smokers, vegetarians, globetrotters, and environmental activists. How many poetry magazine editors and non-profit publishers there are among all those award-winning authors of suburban and collegetown opuses, multiply divorced and remarried ex-hippies with paid-off mortgages […]
Today, when I am initiated as a pioneer I state on the pioneer’s oath the following: That I shall learn and work hard and be a good friend; That I shall love our self-governed homeland, the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia; That I shall contribute to brotherhood and unity and the ideas Tito fought for; That I shall respect all […]