Identity and Conflict in the Balkans

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Identity and Conflict in the Balkans

• Eleventh Week

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News

• Presidential visit NATO expansion

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Ismail Kadare (1936- )

• Prilli i Thyer (1978) ("Broken April", 1980)
• Numerous novels
• Status as major writer of the Balkans

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Themes of Broken April

• Urban vs. mountain culture
• Past affects the present
• Tenacity of old moral codes Kanun, blood feud

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Counting Victims?
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Film types Heroic (Behind Enemy Lines)

• Overcome obstacles
• Good guys victorious
• Black and white characters

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Non-heroic

• Uncomfortable
• No clear answers
• No easy solutions

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Both

• Strong images
• Action, suspense, romance

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Bosnia

• Ethnic mix distinctive because of religious, not
  linguistic base
• More intense ethnic feeling
• Croats, Serbs, Muslims
• Muslims converted by Turks
• Cosmopolitan center Sarajevo
• Recent book by Bill Carter Fools Rush In

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Siege of Sarajevo

• 1992-96
• Blockade 400k residents trapped
• Thousands killed
• Variety of human rights violations
• UN food airlifts in June 1992
• Declared over in February 1996
• Population 650k to 220k (400k now)

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Serbian Orthodox Church (Sarajevo)
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Jewish Cemetery
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Inside Sarajevo Synagogue
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Bey Mosque in Sarajevo
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Assassination of Archduke 1914
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Welcome to Sarajevo

• Directed by Michael Winterbottom
• 1997 film

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Whats Happening?

• Reporters trying to understand
• Different reporting styles question of
  objectivity, taking sides
• Relationship with locals

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Struggles with objectivity

• Food for locals the eggs
• Double life dealing with strangers who dont
  have a clue

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Who is the enemy?
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What about the children?
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UN Presence

• What can the UN do?
• What about priorities?
• What are the top 14?

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Documenting the horror

• Concentration camps
• Bombs, snipers, and soldiers

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Personalizing the conflict

• Woody Harrelson visits the father of prisoner
• Stephen takes up the orphans cause
• Promises
• Taking sides?

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Escape from Sarajevo

• Departure
• Stops along the way
• Massacre remains
• Serb patrol
• Arrival in Split

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Concert in Sarajevo

• Vedran Smailovic
• Bread line massacre in May 1992
• 22 people killed
• He played 22 days in front of the bakery to
  commemorate the victims
• Albinonis Adagio in G Minor