| ID | 179528 |
| Title Proper | Identity, ethnic boundaries, and collective victimhood |
| Other Title Information | analysing strategies of self-victimisation in postwar Bosnia-Herzegovina |
| Language | ENG |
| Author | Mijić, Ana |
| Summary / Abstract (Note) | Characteristics from the social construction of ‘self’ and of ‘others’ in Bosnia-Herzegovina show that the creation of a positive self-image in this post-war society is strongly connected with collective self-victimisation of one’s own in-group. An objective hermeneutical analysis of narrative interviews conducted with Bosniaks, Bosnian Croats, and Bosnian Serbs reveals five self-victimisation strategies: Two dissociative strategies, which conspicuously reproduce the dichotomy of victim and perpetrator along ethnic lines and candidly reinforce the ethnic boundaries – moral alchemy and double relativisation – and three strategies, which seem to transcend the boundaries between ethnic in-group and out-group – the associative strategies of subjectification of war, the externalisation of responsibility, and silence. A subsequent contextualisation of the identified strategies indicates, however, that, ultimately, associative strategies are equally conducive to the further manifestation of ethnic boundaries. |
| `In' analytical Note | Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power Vol. 28, No.4; Aug 2021: p.472-491 |
| Journal Source | Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power 2021-08 28, 4 |
| Key Words | Post-War ; Bosnia-Herzegovin ; Self-Victimisation ; Identityethnic Boundaries |