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Bibliography of oral history

sources in the regions of the


former Yugoslavia
An outline of oral history projects and individual publications based on war experiences in
the Balkan regions Bosnia Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Serbia, Slovenia, Montenegro and
Macedonia.

This bibliography is divided into two parts. The first part consists of projects aimed
at creating oral history collections, which is an archival effort to document historical
themes in a broad sense. The second part lists research projects of individual
scholars who have used oral history as the central method to gather their data.
Both parts are arranged in geographical order. The information has been gathered
by consulting the internet for open access sources and moreover gathered by
consulting oral history specialists such as Selma Leydersdorf, Stef Scagliola and
finished master student Laura Boerhout. An email has been send out to a number
of projects for additional information..
Keywords: interview projects Bosnia Herzegovina, Kosovo, Croatia, oral history
projects, war testimonies Balkan, survival testimonies Bosnia and Herzegovina

Barbara Safradin
Honours Programme E-Humanities
Supervisor: Stef Scagliola
Project Balkan Voices
Erasmus Studio, University of Rotterdam

Part 1
Projects related to Kosovo
1.Title: Kosovo Roma Oral Histories Project, Who we were, who we are: Kosovar Roma
oral histories;
Archival location: Mahallas, Kosovo
Management and administration: The Open Society Institute & Soros Foundations
Network
Timeframe: December 2002- July 2003
Access: Open
Format: Audio (some interviewees have been videotaped)
Transcript: Avalaible
Website: http://www.projectbalkan.org/roma/index.shtml
Description: This project aims at collecting interviews based on personal lives and histories
of the Kosovar Roma. Complete with photos, scans, video and sound clips, reports on the
minority condition of Romas in Kosovo and Europe.
Scale: 80 interviews in total, 50 interviews which you can find on the website, 30 interviews
are not included in this project
Language
Original: Albanian, Serbian and Romanes
Subtitle: English
Funding: The Open Society Institute's Roma Culture Initiative,
Implemented by: Sebastjan Serifovic, Adem Osmani and Aferdita Berisha.
Contact details: Bobby Anderson, Project Director, roma@csdbalkans.org
N.B.: the site offers a combination of videotape interviews and interviews which are not
videotaped, duo to the fact that some interviewees requested not to be videotaped and their
narratives have been anonymized and put online as transcripts.
2.Title: Qendra Multimedia, Kosovar history laboratory,
Archival Location: Pristina, Kosovo
Management and administration: Qendra Multimedia
Timeframe: March until July 2009
Access: Open
Format: Video
Transcript: not available
Website: www.kosovarhistory.com
Description: A research project on the 60ies and 70ies in Kosovo . This website presents
the history of the 1960s and 1970s in Kosovo through short videos in which people from
Kosovo tell about how they have experienced these two decades. The contemporary
witnesses, who have been interviewed, tell about their family life at that time, their education,
the working conditions, the process of modernization, about living together with other ethnic
groups and important political events. Half of the videos are subtitled in English and are
presented in the English section of the website.
Scale: a total of 12 interviews with Albanians, Roma and Turks in different places in Kosovo
have been conducted
Language
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Original: Albanian, Serbian


Subtitle: 50% English, 50% Albanian and Serbian
Funding: Qendra Multimedia
Contact details: timon@qendra.org, Timon Perabo:(038 722 463) or Fatime Kosumi (038
722 463).
N.B.: The videos are sorted in three categories: by theme, by testimonies and by places.
You can leave comments behind on what you think of the website and the presentation
Target group: the Kosovar history laboratory is set up to guide young people in exploring
parts of their countries history the sixties and seventies through interviews
3.Title: Project I want to be Heard, NGO Integra
Timeframe: 2008-2009
Archival Location: Mitrovica, Kosovo
Management and administration: NGO Integra
Access: open (transcripts can be found in the book I want to be heard)
Format: Transcripts covered in a book called I want to be heard
Transcript: available in the book
Website: http://www.ngo-integra.org/events/428/
Description: By recording the memories of victims and participants of the last war in Kosovo,
this project aimed to contribute to the process of dealing with the past in this area and
strengthening individual and collective capacities for reconciliation.
Scale: This project consisted on finding and interviewing 10 war victims in Kosovo and
publishing these interview transcripts on a book named I want to be heard.
Language
Original: Albanian, Serbian
Subtitle: Albanian, Serbian
Funding: IKV/Pax Christi
Partners: OGI (from Nis Serbia) and CBM (Mitrovica Kosovo)
Contact: details: ngo_integra@yahoo.com
N.B.: A group of 5 activists from Kosovo (NGO members, journalists, students) were
sensitized, informed and trained to conduct interviews and record memories of victims and
participants through a 5 days seminar which was held in Novi Pazar, Kosovo
4.Title: War crime documentation project
Timeframe: March - June 1999
Archival Location: Chicago-Kent college of Law and Illinois Indstitutional
Management and administration: Kosovo
Access: No open access, the results of the interviews are published in a groundbreaking
report, Political Killings in Kosova/Kosovo and are collected in a database which can only be
accessed with authorization
Format: Video
Transcript: Unavailable
Website: http://pbosnia.kentlaw.edu/projects/warcrimes/
http://proceedings.esri.com/library/userconf/proc00/professional/papers/pap319/p319.htm
Description: The War Crimes Documentation Project encompasses citizen interviews from
Kosovo, with the eventual goal to create a database which will be a larger, centralized
database that will be used to store all information collected during a humanitarian crisis.
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Scale: In Kosovo, the War Crimes Documentation Project and its partner NGOs conducted
3,353 interviews with Kosovar refugees in Albania, Kosovo and the United States
Language
Original: Albanian& Serbian
Subtitle: English
Funding: Illinois Institute of Technology and the Chicago-Kent School of Law
Contact details: atkins@iit.edu, warcrimes@wcl.american.edu
Partners: American Bar Association (ABA), Central European and Eurasian Law Initiative
(CEELI)Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG), The Benetech Initiative
N.B.: A unique feature of the database will be the inclusion of GIS (Geographical Information
Systems) technology. After data has been collected through interviews, investigators will be
able to view the location of the crimes mentioned in the interviews on a computerized map of
the region.
5.Title: Kosovo: Innovations for Successful Societies
Timeframe: 2007
Archival Location: Princeton
Management and administration: Innovations for Successful Societies (ISS)
Access: partly open (Of the 1900 interviews, 346 are made public on the website. The
remainder were either conducted as research for background material to inform our case
studies and will never be published, or we are in the process of transcribing/translating them,
or we are waiting for clearance from the interviewees. We usually publish the entire
transcript in PDF and text form, and we usually post the audio version of the interview, but in
some exceptions where the sound quality is bad, where the interviewee asks to cut a
section, or where the subject matter does not pertain to our research only a part of the
interview is published online.)
Format: Video
Transcript: Available on PDF format
Website:http://www.princeton.edu/successfulsocieties/oralhistories/filter.xml?magic_roxen_
automatic_charset_variable=%C3%A5%C3%A4%C3%B6%E8%8A%9F@UTF8LK&focus_area=all&critical_task=all&region_country=32&search=Filter
Description: The initiators have conducted a total of 2000 interviews from countries around
the whole world. Four of these countries are conducted in the Balkan, namely Kosovo,
Albania, Bosnia Herzegovina, and Macedonia. Within Kosovo, 12 interviews are conducted
with Kosovar people who play an important role in politics.
Scale: The innovations for Succesvol Societies community has conducted in total
Approximately 1900 interviews they range from 30 minutes to 360 minutes in which a total
of 12 interviews are conducted in Kosovo and the rest mainly in the Balkan regions (Albania,
Bosnia Herzegovina, and Macedonia)
Language
Original: English
Subtitle: English
Funding: The majority of the funding comes from Princeton University. They also receive
support from some private donors/foundations who are confidential
Contact details: mkilleen@princeton.edu, bacon@princeton.edu
N.B.: Many of the interviews can be downloaded to smartphones, MP3 players or other
downloadable media devices both in audio form and as transcripts, subject to limitations
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noted & a description of the full profile of the interviewee can be seen on the website
6.Title: Frontline, War in Europe: NATOS 1999 war against Serbia and Kosovo,
Archival location: America (rest unknown)
Management and administration: PBS (Public broadcasting service)
Timeframe:1995-2012
Access: Transcripts can be accessed on the website, educational videotapes of "War in
Europe" are only available for purchase by schools, libraries and other educational
institutions
Format: Video
Transcript: Available
Website: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/kosovo/
Language
Original: English
Subtitle: English
Description: The reporters for "War in Europe" interviewed Serb soldiers, KLA fighters, and
Albanian survivors. All spoke on the condition that they remain anonymous. Names, dates
and details of specific events that could be used to identify them have been edited from
these transcripts.
Scale: the total of interviews are divided into the following categories: policy makers and
analysts: 6 interviews, military leaders: 4 interviews, negotiators: 3 interviews, Serbs 2
interviews and Kosovo Albanians: 3 interviews
Funding: PBS (Public broadcasting Service), PBS is an American non-commercial
broadcasting channel
Contact details: pbsfoundation@pbs.org
Projects related to Bosnia-Herzegovina
1.Title: Genocide Film Library
Timeframe: December 2011
Archival Location: Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina
Management and administration: Cinema for peace foundation
Access: 10 interviews are open access, rest: no open access
Format: Video and audio
Transcript: unavailable
Website: www.cinemaforpeace.ba
Description: The Genocide Film Library will provide an essential contribution to currently
available oral history material focused on Bosnia-Herzegovina and the events of the 19921995 conflict. Once completed, it will be a valuable resource for scholars, educators and
students, curators and researchers, NGO activists and filmmakers. The Library is not only a
resource for the citizens of Bosnia-Herzegovina, but instead a project that will be global in
impact.
Scale: The Genocide Film Library will bring together audiovisual testimonies of 10.000
survivors of the Srebrenica genocide
Language
Original: Bosnian
Subtitle: English
Funding: Stability pact for South Eastern Europe, sponsored by Germany
Contact details: info@cinemaforpeace.ba, +387 33 218 397
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2.Title: Global Giving, The Center for Peacebuildings Oral History Project
Timeframe: Unknown
Archival Location: Bosnia and Herzegovina
Management and administration: Global Giving
Access: Registration obliged
Format:
Transcript: Unavailable
Website: http://www.globalgiving.org/projects/oral-history-bosnia/
Language
Original: Bosnian
Subtitle: English
Description: The Center for Peacebuildings Oral History Project will address Bosnia and
Herzegovinas past while, through individual narratives, promoting a peaceful future built on
the mutual needs for security and coexistence.
Funding information: Funding by donors,total Funding Received to Date: $40
Remaining Goal to be Funded: $39,960
Total Funding Goal: $40,000
Contact details: Vahidin Omanovic, unvocim@yahoo.com
N.B.: In publishing a book of narratives and holding events and dialogues about its themes,
the project will promote inter-ethnic coexistence and reconciliation.
PDF file with more information about the project:
http://www.globalgiving.org/pfil/10611/projdoc.pdf
3. Title: Living with Landmines, fifteen years of living with landmines
Kathryn W David foundation Projects
Timeframe: 2011
Archival Location: United States, Colgate University
Management and administration: Unknown
Access: No open access
Format: no video and audio, book with quotations of the interviews
Transcript: unavailable
Website: PDF: http://www.davisprojectsforpeace.org/media/view/1854/original/
Scale: started with 10 former soldiers, expended to interviews with more soldiers and
educators (scale unknown)
Description: While in Bosnia, interviews will be held with landmine survivors to try and
understand the challenges they face in daily life. The goal is to show that a landmine injury
is life-long, and thus survivors need continued support from their government, families,
communities, and international organizations.
Funding: Kathryn W. Davis Foundation.
Language
Original: Bosnian
Subtitle: English
Contact details: livingwithlandmines@gmail.com
N.B.: A report will be submitted to the foundation in September next year. There will also be
publishing a book. This book exists of brief interjections of the authors and quotes from
interviews.
4. Title: The United states Holocaust Memorial Museum- From Memory To Action: Meeting
The Challenge of Genocide
Timeframe: Unknown
Archival Location: Washington, USA
Management and administration: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum,
Washington, USA
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Access: Open
Format: Audio with Video
Transcript: Available
Website: http://www.ushmm.org/genocide/take_action/gallery/portraits/bosnia
Scale: 6 interviews were conducted by the Holocaust Museum about the lives of two
journalists, a human rights activist, a survivor, a perpetrator and an aid worker.
Description: From Memory To Action: Meeting The Challenge of Genocide is an interactive
installation that uses cutting edge technology and compelling eyewitness stories to invite
visitors to join a growing community of people taking action against genocide. Located in the
Museum's Wexner Center, the installation introduces visitors to the concept and law of
genocide, to three contemporary cases of genocide Rwanda, Srebrenica in BosniaHerzegovina, and the Darfur region of Sudan and to eyewitness testimonies from
activists, survivors, rescuers, journalists, humanitarian aid workers, and more.
Funding: Founder's Society, Wings of Memory Society, Legacy of Light Society
Language
Original: English
Subtitle: English, 1 interview: Bosnian
N.B.: If you want to visit the museum online, a registration is obliged
Contact details: Main telephone: (202) 488-0400
TTY: (202) 488-0406
5. Title: The Bosnia Memory project
Timeframe: 2006
Archival Location: St. Louis, USA
Management and administration: Fontbonne University
Access: Registration obliged
Format: Video and audio
Transcript: unavailable
Scale: an enduring record of Bosnian genocide survivors, quantity is therefore still unknown
Website: http://www.fontbonne.edu/bosnia
Language
Original: English
Subtitle: English
Description: The Bosnia Memory Project at Fontbonne University is dedicated to
establishing an enduring record of Bosnian genocide survivors, especially those living in
metropolitan St. Louis. Fontbonne faculty, students and staff collaborate with members of St.
Louis's Bosnian community to record interviews of Bosnian genocide survivors and their
relatives; collect books, letters, and photographs that reflect the culture and experiences of
Bosnians; Host events that raise awareness about the experiences and identity of St. Louis's
Bosnian population; and Develop academic and co-curricular programming that promotes
understanding of Bosnia, Bosnians, and Bosnian-Americans.
Funding: The Fontbonne Community Connection
Contact details: Dr. Ben Moore at (314) 889-4553 or bmoore@fontbonne.edu.
6. Title: FAMA Collection Video Oral-History the Siege of Sarajevo 1992-1996:by
Suada Kapic
Timeframe: March 1992-March 1996
Archival location: Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina
Management and organisation: FAMA archives
Access: open
Format: Audio and video
Transcript: unavailable
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Scale: 1000 oral history interviews will be used for new Siege of Sarajevo museum, 987
interviews (30 hours) are available for viewing on FAMA Collection website
Website: http://www.famacollection.org/eng/general-information/about-virtual-famacollection/index.html
http://www.famacollection.org/eng/fama-collection/oral-history/index.html
Language
Original: Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian
Subtitle: English
Description: A Oral History collection about the experience of the Siege of Sarajevo 92-96.
This collection was conducted relatively soon after the siege was lifted while memories
were still fresh. The Collection contains 1,000 translates video interviews with over 450
Sarajevans politicians, doctors, children, generals, artists, journalists, teachers,
housewives, actors, innovators, ordinary citizens. It was able to capture their personal
experience and witness to the events in chronological order, from March 1992 to March
1996.
Funding: Embassy of the United States in Bosnia & Herzegovina, NED (National
Endownment for democracy), British Embassy, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, BTD
(Balkan trust for democracy), British Embassy, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Catalan
Fond for Cooperation and Development.
Contact details: Suada Kapic, info@famacollection.org
N.B.: you can search the interviews on year and month
Projects related to Croatia
1.Title: Istrian destiny (Istrians in the concentration camps during the II World War and after),
Timeframe: 2006
Archival Location: Czech Republic
Management and administration: Memory of nations
Access: The access to the Memory of Nation has two levels - the first one works without
any log in and its designated for "normal" common users and fans of history. In this level the
visitor has access to the witnesses stories in form of record samples (that means mainly the
most interesting parts from the interview) and to the witnesses background stories. The
second level is for more academic / research use - after requesting a log in can the concrete
researcher get to the complete database - full length records, all additional information. Both
level are of course accessible for free.
Format: Audio with video
Transcript: a part of the transcript is available, a full record and protocol is available only for
registered researchers
Website: http://www.pametnaroda.cz/project/detail/id/26
Scale: 3 testimonies of witnesses
Language
Original: Slovak
Subtitle: no subtitle available
Description: The aim was to gather as more testimonies as possible of camp survivors
within the period 191-1945 and to record their stories. Project is a part of domain that
gathers oral history,the testimonies of " ordinary people" whose stories are authentic
representation of human destiny affected by the maelstrom of war.
Funding: Memory of Nations
Cooperation: Istarsko povijesno drutvo
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Contact details: Mikul Kroupa - project leader, mikulas.kroupa@centrum.cz


N.B.: Authors of the project recorded a 12 minute documentary, and the further plan is to
publish the research results. A biography of the survivors is included on the website as well.
The project is produced by the Memory of nations and it is interesting to know that these are
the statistics of the registered users: between in total 2958 registered researchers (since the
year 2008), there are 137 historians, 673 students, 76 journalists, 1408 amateur researchers
and 166 teachers.
2.Title: History and language of Moravian Croats
Implemented by: Association of Croats in the Czech republic
Timeframe: 2009-2010
Archival Location: Czech Republic
Management and administration: Memory of nations
Access: The access to the Memory of Nation has two levels - the first one works without
any log in and its designated for "normal" common users and fans of history. In this level the
visitor has access to the witnesses stories in form of record samples (that means mainly the
most interesting parts from the interview) and to the witnesses background stories. The
second level is for more academic / research use - after requesting a log in can the concrete
researcher get to the complete database - full length records, all additional information. Both
level are of course accessible for free.
Format: Audio
Transcript: a part of the transcript is available, a full record and protocol is available only for
registered researchers
Website: http://www.pametnaroda.cz/project/witness/id/21
Scale: Number of published witnessed interviews: 15
Language
Original: Czech
Subtitle: no subtitle
Description: The target of it was to record memories of Moravian Croats within the period of
1941-1945.
Funding: Memory of Nations
Contact details: mikulas.kroupa@centrum.cz
N.B.: Next to the audio files is a photo gallery included in which several photos of the
survivals can be seen
3. Title: Stories of growing up Croatian American
Timeframe: 1999-2000
Archival Location: Francisco, USA
Management and administration: Croatian American culture centre
Access: open
Format: No audio and video
Transcript: available
Website: http://www.slavonicweb.org/oral-histories.php
Scale: a total of 9 interviews has put online
Language
Original: English
Subtitle: English
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Funding: Alliance for California Traditional Arts, The San Francisko Foundation, The William
and Flora Hewlett Foundation, California Arts Council
Description: The primary objective of the project is to document the life stories of members
of the Croatian American Cultural Center of San Francisco, and to present them on Slavonic
web, the official website of the Center. Their stories will be used to understand the life of
Croatians growing up in America better. An element in the interviews is the influence of
music and photographs as common threads in the interviews.
N.B.: When the interviewee has requested anonymity, a pseudonym is provided in quotes.
Contact details: Nancy MacKay, project director, 510-649-0941
4.Title: Project television schedule Istrian faiths
Timeframe: February 2011
Archival Location: Istria, Croatia
Management and administration: Hist(o)ria, Istrian Historical Society
Access: Open
Format: Audio and video
Transcript: unavailable
Website: http://ipd-ssi.hr/?page_id=211
Scale: So far the testimony of 52 witnesses were recorded, of which 22 victims and 30
victims, deported to death camps or forced labour, 5 of these interviews have been put
online
Language
Original: Croatian
Subtitle: unavailable
Funding:
Description: The goal of the project is to collect as many survivor testimonies and inmates
and record their stories. The research falls within the domain of collecting oral histories ("oral
history"), testimonies of ordinary people whose stories are authentic view the fate of people
affected maelstrom of war.
Contact details: histria@ipd-ssi.hr, istra@ipd-ssi.hr
Projects related to Slovenia
1.Title: European resitance Archive (ERA)
Timeframe: on-going
Archival location: unknown
Management and administration: European resistance archive
Access: Open
Format: Video
Transcript: available in PDF format
Scale: A total of 21 interviews are put online in a video format of which 3 of this total are
Slovenian witnesses.
Website: http://www.resistance-archive.org/en/testimonies
Description: ERA is an archive e in which individual stories of people having resisted
against the terror, humiliation and despair fascism brought over Europe are kept alive and
visible for everybody. The interviews are conducted in the following countries: Poland,
Slovenia, Austria, France, Italy and Germany. But it would be in the sense of the project to
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extend the range of countries and in future being able to integrate every European country
being afflicted by fascism and Nazism.
Language
Original: Slovenian
Subtitle: English
Funding: CultureLabs eG
Contact details: era@resistance-archive.org
N.B.: In the process of creating this new platform, young people participated actively in the
realization of the project in form of doing the interviews. The young participants were guided
in their work by historians, memory worker and a professional video-team.

Projects related to Serbia- Work in progress


1.Title:
Timeframe: 1999
Archival location: Novi Sad
Management and administration: War Trauma Center Novi sat
Access:
Format:
Transcript:
Scale:
Website:
Description:
Language
Original:
Subtitle:
Funding: Dutch Foundation Mala Sirena
Contact details: office@wartrauma.org
N.B.:
Title: Vlah Oral Documentation Project, Noa Treister
Timeframe: 1995
Archival location: Serbia
Management and administration:
Access:
Format:
Transcript:
Scale:
Website: www.kulturavlaha.org
Description: a project recording the language, history and culture of the Vlah minority in
Eastern Serbia
Language
Original:
Subtitle:
Contact details: Noa.treister@gmail.com
N.B.
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Projects related to Macedonia/Montenegro


*After the research on internet and conducting information through email communication the
conclusion is that the oral history projects within Macedonia are not found online. It could be
well possible that they exist, but there are, as far are, as the research shows, no oral history
projects related to Macedonia which are put online. This also counts for Montenegro.

GENERAL
Title: The Balkans Project: words and art from Balkan, Americanization/Balkanization:
Where Opposites Meet
Timeframe: September 2007 until may 2008
Archival Location: Washington, USA
Management and administration: Balkan (Macedonia, Bosnia Herzegovina, Croatia,
Serbia, Albania and Kosovo)
Access: Open
Format: no audio and video (will be put online shortly)
Transcript: available
Scale: a total of 75 interviews within the Balkan are conducted in the regions Macedonia,
Bosnia Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia, Albania and Kosovo
Website: http://balkansproject.ips-dc.org/
Description: This website documents a long-range cultural research and exchange project
called Americanization/Balkanization: Where Opposites Meet, which takes its inspiration
from the parallels between the diverse and dynamic cultures of the United States and
countries in the Balkan region. The interviews, conducted by John Feffer, co-director of
FPIF, with artists, activists, and scholars in the Balkans provide diverse perspectives on
identity, race, and the perception of the United States in the Balkans.
Language
Original:
Subtitle: English
N.B.: The interviews are only displayed by transcript, no audio is available on the website
Contact details: johnfeffer@gmail.com

Part 2
Individual publications
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Articles related to Kosovo


-T.Baar & J. Baer, research on the history and work of Community Building Mitrovica,
CBMtrovica, 2012.
During 7 weeks of fieldwork in Kosovo, primarily in the Mitrovica area, interviews were held
with key figures of local government, civil society, and representatives of the international
community. The aim was to uncover what the methodology behind the work of CBM is.
Scale: unknown
Affiliation:
Contact:
Books related to Kosovo
-P. Polansky, One blood, one flame : the oral histories of the Yugoslav gypsies before,
during and after WWII, Nish, Serbia : KRRF (Kosovo Roma Refugee Foundation), 20072008.
The collection, "One Blood, One Flame" was a three-year project, filming interviews with 154
Gypsy survivors of WWII throughout the former Yugoslavia. Each volume contains a DVD
with excerpts of the filmed interviews.
Affiliation: American author and Romani rights activist
Contact:
Books related to Bosnia and Herzegovina
-F. Markowitz, Sarajevo. A Bosnian kaleidoscope (Chicago 2010) , pp. 220.
Fran Markowitzs Sarajevo: A Bosnian Kaleidoscope is an ethnographic study of themodern
city which foregrounds the multiple, overlapping histories and their shiftinginterpretations that
shape how residents of Sarajevo today define themselves as persons and members of
different communities.
Scale: unknown
Review: http://www.scribd.com/doc/47833395/Book-review-of-Sarajevo-by-F-Markowitz
Affiliation: Department of Sociology and Anthropology
Contact: fran@bgu.ac.il
-I. Maek, Sarajevo under siege. Anthropology in wartime (Pennsylvania 2009).
Maek draws attention to the lived experiences of Sarajevans from different ethnonational
backgrounds as they negotiated the violence that surrounded them, providing a novel
contribution to the literature on the Bosnian War from 1992 to 1995 with firsthand
observation and telling insights.
Scale: unknown
Affiliation: Associated Professor of Cultural Anthropology and Senior Lecturer in Genocide
Studies at the Hugo Valentin Center of Uppsala University, Sweden
Contact: ivana.macek@valentin.uu.se
- Julie Mertus, Berkkley, The Suitcase refugee voices from Bosnia and Croatia : with
contributions from over seventy-five refugees and displaced people / edited by; Los Angeles
; London : University of California Press, 1997.
In this book 75 refugees from Croatia and Bosnia Herzegovina tell their own stories about
their lives as refugees in their own voices, through stories, essays, poems, and letters.
Affiliation: American University, Co directer of the MA prgram, Ethics, peace and Global
affairs
Contact: mertus@american.edu
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- Selma Leydesdorff, Surviving The Bosnian Genocide: The Women Of Srebrenica Speak,
Trans. Kay Richardson. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2011. 242 pp.
Overview: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/surviving-the-bosnian-genocide-selmaleydesdorff/1102991366
Surviving the Bosnian Genocide is based on the testimonies of 60 female survivors of the
massacre who were interviewed by Dutch historian Selma Leydesdorff.
Affiliation: University of Amsterdam
Capacitygroup: religionstudies
Contact details: S.Leijdesdorff@uva.nl
- Silvia Salvatici, 'Public Memory, Gender, and National Identity in Postwar Kosovo: The
Albanian Community' in P. Hamilton & L.Hopes, Oral history and public memories, Temple
Universiy press: 2008, Philadelphia.
In review: http://ohr.oxfordjournals.org/content/36/1/156.full
Silvia Salvatici's interviewing project with Albanian women in Kosovo during the 1990s
Balkans wars, Public Memory, Gender, and National Identity in Postwar Kosovo: The
Albanian Community, revealed basic changes in this traditional society, showing the
presence of a multiplicity of voices and of diverse individual memories, (26465).
Scale: unknown.
Affiliation: University of Teramo, Italy
Capacity group: Media studies
Contact:
-S. Weine., When History is a Nightmare, Lives and Memories of Ethnic Cleansing in Bosnia
Herzegovina, Rutgers University Press, (1999),
Through the narratives and testimonies of Bosnian refugees who survived ethnic cleansing
in Bosnia-Herzegovina, this title demonstrates how ethnic cleansing has worked its way into
people's lives and memories. The quantity of interviews is unknown.
Affiliation: University of Illinois at Chicago, professor of psychiatry
Contact: smweine@uic.edu

-T. Bringa, Being Muslim the Bosnian way. Identity and community in a Central Bosnian
village (Princeton 1995), pp. 281.
This is an ethnographic account of Bosnian Muslims living in a village near Sarajevo.
Affiliation:
Contact:
-X.Bougarel, E. Helms and G. Duijzings (eds.), The new Bosnian mosaic. Identities,
memories and moral claims in a post-war society (Farnham 2007) pp.
The authors of this book argue that while the realities of post-war Bosnia are strongly
influenced by Dayton and the way it has been implemented, they can in no way be reduced
to it. This book offers a re-examination of the Bosnian case with a "bottom-up" perspective. It
gathers together political scientists and social anthropologists, some of whom began working
on Bosnia-Herzegovina in the 1980s (including some from the former Yugoslavia) and others
who discovered the country during and after the war.
Scale: unknown
Affiliation:
Contact:
Books related to Macedonia
-Cannon, I., Oral history of the Macedonia area
14

-Macedonian Welfare Workers Network of Victoria, From War To Whittlesea: Oral Histories
of Macedonian Child Refugees, Pollitecon Publications 1999,pp. 1-96.
From War to Whittlesea is a book of recollections and reflections - dramatic, insightful,
passionate and compassionate - from some of the 28,000 Macedonian child refugees who
were evacuated from their homes in northern Greece between 1948 and 1949 during the
Macedonian struggle for independence in the Greek Civil War. Five of the oral histories are
from child refugees, the sixth is from the mother of one of the children. The six individuals
are from the villages of Bapchor, Lagen, Neret and Krushoradi. All are now Australian
residents.
Articles related to Bosnia Herzegovina
-C. Sorabji, Managing memories in post-war Sarajevo. Individuals, bad memories and new
wars Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 12 (2006).
In this article the author uses the example of 3 Sarajevo Bosniacs whom she has known
since the pre-war 1980s in order to propose the merit of a third, additional, focus on the
individual as an active manager of his or her own memories.
Note: This article is based on fieldwork done before, during and after the war, from 1985 to
2003.
Affiliation: Department of Anthropology
Contact:
-C.Baker, Sdosteuropa, Titos children?: educational resources, language learning and
cultural capital in the life histories of interpreters working in Bosnia-Herzegovina more, 59:4
(2011): pp. 477501.
Drawing on 31 life history interviews conducted in 200910 with language workers who grew
up in former Yugoslavia, this paper seeks to answer whether certain age groups and social
strata that emerged from socialist Yugoslav society were better able to benefit in the SFOR
economy that resulted from the effects of international intervention in BiH.
Affiliation: University of Hull, faculty of Arts and Humanities
Contact: catherine.baker@hull.ac.uk
-C. Baker, & M.Kelly, Interpreting the Peace: Peace Operations, Conflict and Language in
Bosnia-Herzegovina, Palgrave Macmillan: 2012, pp.1-256.
Drawing on more than 50 interviews with military personnel, civilian linguists and locallyrecruited interpreters, the book explores problems such as the contested roles of military
linguists, the challenges of improving a language service in the field, and the function of
nationality and ethnicity in producing trust or mistrust.
-C.Baker, Have You Ever Been in Bosnia? British Military Travelers in the Balkans since
1992, Journeys: the International Journal of Travel and Travel Writing 12:1 (2011): pp.63-92.
This article draws on published memoirs and more than 50 new oral history inter-views with
British peacekeepers and their Bosnian employees to illustrate howBritish military travelers
drew on, perpetuated, and changed the patterns andrepresentation of British travel to the
Balkans.
Catherine Baker, Opening the Black Box: Oral Histories of How Soldiers and Civilians
Learned to translate and Interpret During Peace Support Operations in BosniaHerzegovina, Oral History Forum dhistoire orale 32 (2012), Special Issue Making
Educational Oral Histories in the 21st Century, pp. 1-27.
This paper uses 51 oral history interviews with former military personnel, language trainers
and locally-recruited interpreters to explore how soldiers and civilians were educated into
15

becoming translators and interpreters who worked in support of the multi-national military
force that first deployed into Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1992.
-H. Stefansson Anders, Coffee after cleansing? Co-existence, co-operation, and
communication in post-conflict Bosnia and Herzegovina Focaal. Journal of Global and
Historical Anthropology 57 (2010), pp. 62-76.
This article critically addresses the idea that ethnic remixing alone fosters reconciliation and
tolerance after sectarian conflict, a vision that has been forcefully cultivated by international
interventionists in post-war Bosnia and Herzegovina. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in the
town of Banja Luka, it presents a multi-faceted analysis of the effects of ethnic minority
return on the (re)building of social relations across communal boundaries.
Scale: unknown
Affiliation: Department of Anthropology
Contact: anders.stefansson@anthro.ku.dk

-H. Halilovich, Beyond the sadness: Memories and homecomings among survivors of
cleansing' in a Bosnian village 2011 4: 42 Memory Studies
This article discusses how memories of the 199295 war, ethnic cleansing and genocide in
BosniaHerzegovina are performed and rendered meaningful as identity (re)constructions
among survivors from an ethnically cleansed village in north-western Bosnia. The fieldwork
is based on interview collections of Bosnians living there. Some of these testimonies were
first-hand witness accounts, while other stories were recollections of narratives told and
remembered by others.
Scale: Unknown
Affiliation: Monash University (Australia)
Contact:
-H. Russell, Bosnian Immigrants Perceptions of the United States Health Care System: A
Qualitative Interview Study.Searight, Journal of Immigrant Health vol. 5 issue 2 April 2003. p.
87-93.
As part of a related project, 12 Bosnian immigrants were interviewed about their perceptions
of the U.S. health care system and their experiences as patients.
Affiliation: Lake Superior State University Psychology
Contact:
-J. Mannergren Selimovic, Perpetrators and victims: Local responses to the
International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, FocaalJournal of Global and
Historical Anthropology 57 (2010), pp. 5061.
This article examines local understandings and narratives on justice and reconciliation in
Bosnia and Herzegovina with those of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former
Yugoslavia (ICTY). The article focuses on the communities of Konjic and Srebrenica and the
ICTY outreach conferences held in these towns in 2004 and 2005
Observations at those sites were complemented by twenty-one interviews with individual
participants after the conferences. Roughly half of the participants who were interviewed
were Bosnian Serbs, the other half Bosniacs.
Scale: 21 interviews
Affiliation: School of Global Studies, Gteborgs universitet
Contact details: johanna.mannergren@ui.se
-M.Green, J.Friedman and R.Bennet, Building the Police Service in a Security Vacuum:
International Efforts in Kosovo, 1999-2011, Innovations for successfull societies,
http://www.princeton.edu/successfulsocieties/policynotes/view.xml?id=121.
16

Morgan Greene, Jonathan Friedman and Richard Bennet drafted this case study on the
basis of interviews conducted in Pritina and Mitrovica, Kosovo, in July 2011, as well as
interviews conducted in Kosovo by Arthur Boutellis in July 2008. Case published February
2012.
Scale: 12 interviews
Affiliation: University of Princeton
-N. Basic You cant run away. Former combat soldiers and the role of social perception in
coping with war experience in the Balkans in: Pouligny, Chesteman and Schnabel (eds.)
After mass crime. Rebuilding states and communities (United Nations University Press)
2007 (Bosnia and Croatia)
Contact: Unknown
-P. M. Pickering Generating social capital for bridging
ethnic divisions in the Balkans: Case studies of two Bosniak cities, Ethnic and Racial
Studies, (2006): nr. 1, pp. 79-103.
Drawing on data from interviews and participant observation in several urban areas of
Muslim or Bosniak1-majority Bosnia, the author identifies the institutions and circumstances
in which Bosnians build positive interethnic relations.
Scale: 52 Bosnians and observation of nearly half (twenty-five) of these interviewees in at
least one setting outside the interview
Affiliation: Associate professor of Government, College of William and Mary
Conatct: pmpick@wm.edu
-R.van Boeschoten, The trauma of war rape: A comparative view on the Bosnian conflict and
the Greek civil war, History and Anthropology, 2003, nr. 1, pp. 41-44.
This paper explores the practice and the political context of war rapes in the former
Yugoslavia (1992-1995) and in the Greek Civil War (1946-1949). This argument is illustrated
by a detailed analysis of one particular interview, in which a woman raped during the Greek
Civil War decided to break her silence fifty years after the event. The interview material
offers the opportunity to explore the effects of trauma and the multiple ways in which war
rape victims may try to cope with past trauma and give meaning to a shattered life.
Affiliation: Instituut Voor Esthetica en Cultuurfilosofie (Universiteit van Amsterdam)
Contact: R.vanBoeschoten@uvh.nl
-S. Rutar, Oral History as a Method: Variants of Remembering World War II in Slovenia,
Serbia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina. In: East Central Europe, 34, no. 1/2 (2007): 245-265
This article provides a general overview of research on, and the construction of, the memory
of World War II in socialist Yugoslavia and its successor states, focusing on Slovenia, Serbia,
and Bosnia-Herzegovina, with the intent of placing this topic in the general framework of oral
history and memory research. At the center of attention is the question of how the memories
of eyewitnesses have been possibly shaped, altered, and conditioned by their post-war
socialization, and how this shaping, altering, and conditioning might be allowed for when
interpreting memory source materials.
Affiliation: Institute for East and Southeast European Studies, PhD at the European
University Institute, Florence
Contact: rutar(at)ios-regensburg.de
-S. Leydesdorff,, Stories from No Land: The Women of Srebrenica Speak Out., Human
Rights Review vol. 8 issue 3 April 2007. p. 187 198.
As part of the authors project on the life stories of the women of Srebrenica, she conducted
17

interviews in Srebrenica, the surrounding villages, the camps (collective centers),and in


Sarajevo and its suburbs, where refugees have found shelter. A quantity of the interviews is
unknown.
-S.M. Weine Vojvoda D: Bosnian Refugee Women Resettling at Mid-Life after Ethnic
Cleansing, Refugee 2000; Vol. 16, No. 2: 10-15.
This is a case study of 2 women resettling in the United States after surviving ethnic
cleansing in Bosnia and a discussion of refugee women at mid-life in which these woman
are interviewed.
-S.M. Weine, M.D.; Alma Dzubur Kulenovic, M.D.; Ivan Pavkovic, M.D.; Robert Gibbons,
Ph.D, Testimony Psychotherapy in Bosnian Refugees: A Pilot Study, The American Journal
of Psychiatry, VOL. 155, No. 12 (1998)
Objective: The authors sought to describe the use of the testimony method of psychotherapy
in a group of traumatized adult refugees from genocide in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Method:The subjects were 20 Bosnian refugees in Chicago who gave written informed
consent to participate in a case series study of testimony psychotherapy
-V.Rosnjik, Using Oral History Method in Practice Srebrenica, Everyday Life after Genocide
(2007)

Masterthesis/Phd Thesis related to Bosnia Herzegovina


- E. Jessee, The Limits of Oral History: Ethics and Methodology Amid Highly Politicized
Research Settings. The Oral History Review vol. 38 issue 2 2011. p. 287-307.
The author experienced fourteen months of fieldwork in Rwanda and Bosnia-Hercegovina,
during which the author conducted multiple life history interviews with approximately 100
survivors, ex-combatants, and perpetrators of genocide and related mass atrocities.
Affiliation: University, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, PHD student, Department of Sociology and
Anthropology
Contact: erinjessee@gmail.com
-K. Oskam, Thesis: "I am trying to live."
War rape victims and their position in post-war Bosnia, Papers on the rights of children born
of war rape, and the lack of discussion of sexual violence in Holocaust-historiography.
Affiliation: University of Amsterdam
-L. Boerhout, "Sarajevo's legacy of war. War memorials in the city and contested identities
among the young," (2010 2012)
The thesis deals with the legacy of war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, exploring its public
culture of remembrance and collective memory in present day Sarajevo and investigating
how this affect perceptions of identity and (ethnic) group identifications of youngsters. Based
on fieldwork (mainly oral history interviews) conducted between June and September 2011
Affilliation: University of Amsterdam, Master Holocaust and Genocide studies
-M.Lovrenovic A Penelope Work of Forgetting: Heritage and Remembrances of the WarRidden Past in Central Bosnia and Herzegovina
Affiliation: Department of Anthropology
Contact details: m.lovrenovic@vu.nl

18

- J. Hronesova Everyday Ethno-National Identities of Young People in Bosnia and


Herzegovina, September 2012
This book examines the salience and role of ethno-national identities of young people in
Bosnia and Herzegovina fifteen years after the end of the Bosnian War. The fieldwork
material demonstrates that identities can become multilayered in situations where the other
is personalized and experienced.
Scale: unknown
Affiliation: Institute of Sociology, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic in Prague
Contact details:
PHD related to Macedonia
Ana Miskovska Kajevska
Contact details: ana.miskovska@gmail.com
Affiliation: Political science, University of Amsterdam
Books related to Croatia

Articles related to Croatia


-M. Ostojic, Collective Memory In Personal Accounts Of Veterans Of The Croatian War
1991-1995, N23-24 | 2009 : L'Anthropologie face au moment historique, pp. 75-114.
The aim of this essay is to contribute to the study of collective memory of the violent breakup of former Yugoslavia by analyzing the testimonies of people who have taken part in the
war. This study relies on secondary source testimonies of people who participated in the
armed conflicts that took place in Croatia between 1991 and 1995.
Scale : unknown.
Affiliation:
Contact:
-S. Jansen The Violence of Memories:Local narratives of the past after ethnic cleansing in
Croatia, Rethinking History 6:1 (2002), pp. 7794.
This text explores how Serbian and Croatian villagers who had lived in the same location for
most of their lives remembered local history in radically different ways.
Affiliation: University of Hull
Contact details:
-V. Colic-Peisker, Migration, Class and Transnational Identities: Croatians in Australia and
America. Studies of World Migrations Series. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2008. xii +
252 pp.
Review: http://bakercatherine.wordpress.com/book-reviews/migration-class-andtransnational-identities/
Colic-Peisker engages with Australian sociological debates about multiculturalism and
assimilation, hints at how changes in Australian immigration policy structured the profile of
Croatian migration to this particular hostland, and grounds her findings in her interviews with
40 working-class and middle-class Croatians negotiating the workplaces and sprawling
19

suburbs of Perth.
Affiliation:
Contact:

Articles related to Serbia


Jelena Cvorovic, 'Gypsy oral history in Serbia: from poverty to culture', Oral History, 33, no.
1 (2005).

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