Copyright by Halide Velioglu 2011 The Dissertation Committee for Halide Velioglu certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation: BOSNIAK SENTIMENTS: The Poetic and Mundane Life of Impossible Longings Committee: ____________________________________ Kathleen C. Stewart, Supervisor ____________________________________ Pauline T. Strong, Co-Supervisor ____________________________________ Elizabeth L. Keating ____________________________________ Kamran A. Ali ____________________________________ Mary Neuburger ____________________________________ John Downing BOSNIAK SENTIMENTS: The Poetic and Mundane Life of Impossible Longings by Halide Velioglu, B.A., M.A. Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of The University of Texas at Austin in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Texas at Austin May 2011 Dedication For My Mother and My Aunt Acknowledgements “Bosniak Sentiments” is the culmination of my strong attachments to the motherland. I am thankful to all my beloveds on and around these pages who shared coffee and conversations (and cigarettes) throughout this work with me. My special and hearty gratitude goes to the Sprzo family that made this work possible by all means. Thank you also to the Melic and Kurtovic families, and Stanic sisters for sharing their mundane lives generously with me. I will always be indebted to Teta Seka’s friendship and care as well as Lejla and Zora (in memoriam) for being the best konas I could ever imagine. Thanks to the Department of Anthropology, the Graduate School, Rhonda Andrews (in memoriam), Elizabeth (in memoriam) and Robert Fernea, and Sharmila Rudrappa for the financial support in the form of teaching and research assistantships and fellowships. Nukhet Sirman was the initial motive for me to pursue a graduate degree in Anthropology like many other Social Science students from Bogazici University, Istanbul. In 2000, I came to Austin to work with Begonia Aretxaga whose untimely passing is still an irrecoverable loss. Her luminous scholarship and the beautiful memory of her warm persona are always with me. Kathleen Stewart is the major inspiration and courage behind this work. Her kind mentorship will always give me a sense of privilege while her pioneering work will be a source of humility. Pauline Strong’s sustained effort to remind me of the responsibility towards the forerunners of our discipline is one of the most precious gains of writing within the confines of academia; I will always be grateful v for her kind advisorship. Elizabeth Keating’s generous engagement at every stage of the work within the best tradition of academic culture is one of the outstanding experiences of this process; I feel lucky and indebted. And, Kamran Ali’s friendly guidance was very crucial in terms of reminding me of the significance of broader issues and the question of the future in my work; I am grateful. My gratitude extends to John Downing and Mary Neuburger, whose valuable readership punctuated the significant features of the future agenda of this work. I also thank Kamala Visweswaran and my colleagues in the 2008-09 dissertation writing group for their generous comments. Can Aciksoz, Zeynep Korkman, Siyar Ozsoy, and Ruken Sengul’s friendships were my home in Austin, whereas Nikola Rajic’s brotherhood was a grace-land where we cultivated and mourned Yugoslav sensibilities; I am indebted. I will always keep Zehra Cunillera, Yasar Dicle Erkenci, Nazli Okten, and Ruken Sengul’s precious readership and belief in me as a talisman on my heart. I am also indebted to Zeynep Gursel, Mathangi Krishnamurthy, Diya Mehra, Neery Melkonian, Vivian Newdick, Jason Pine, Jacqueline Polvora, Mubbashir Rizvi, Sharmila Rudrappa, Apen Ruiz, Gulnur Savran, and Heather Teague for their invaluable intellectual and emotional support. Friendships with Funda Odemis, Ferah Aydin, Nilufer Kaptanoglu, and Aysen Ozkan have been a tremendous source of energy and enrichment at all times; whereas the warm company of Reyyan Bal, Mustafa Bal, and Andrea Peres in Sarajevo were of the most precious gifts of the city; I am grateful to all. My hearty gratitude goes to my family, Yasemin and Bedrettin Ozcelik, Dicle and vi Derya Erkenci whose kindness and patience were vital through the entire work. Finally, I am indebted to the beautiful memory of my father, Mehmet Velioglu whose belief in me provided me with the strength when I needed it most; and, grateful to the sweet memory of my congenial companion, Ozlem Okur, who kept me with the warmest company during long hours of writing. She was the fairy. vii BOSNIAK SENTIMENTS: The Poetic and Mundane Life of Impossible Longings Halide Velioglu, Ph.D. The University of Texas at Austin, 2010 Supervisors: Kathleen C. Stewart and Pauline T. Strong This ethnographic work is about the aesthetic, habitual, and sentimental registers of some Bosnian Muslims’ (Bosniaks) daily lives in post-war Sarajevo. It addresses the ages-old themes of Bosnians’ multiple belongings and the question of political subjectivity through lived experience with a particular focus on the contemporary urgency to generate Bosniak national and religious subjectivity. It attends to the affective surplus of mundane scenes that convey the disconcerting drama of conversion to Islam, the nervous accumulation of new Islamic sensibilities, the vibrant ethos of Yugoslavism, the politically vulnerable but habitually engrained identity of Bosniannes, shared memories of the recent war, and the sustenance of the material and sentimental textures of domestic and communal life. Attending to the eventful character of the daily life enables the work to detail and test the existing frames of understanding Bosniaks (such as Nationalization and Islamization) and to further explore the potentialities of lived experience that escape existing regimes of representation. viii TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction..........................................................................................................................1 SECTION I: SERB EPIC POETRY AND BOSNIAK SENTIMENTS............................18 Chapter 1: Prelude: Kosovka Devojka (The Kosovo Girl) and some Sarajevan Girls’ 1989 Get-together in Istanbul.....................................18 Kosovo Girl............................................................................................................24 The Battle of Kosovo, Serb Epic Poetry, and Myths.............................................28 Back to Kosovo Girl and Summer 1989 Reunion in Istanbul................................44 Chapter 2: We Accept: Epic, Decadence, and Laughter....................................................61 She, My Aunt.........................................................................................................61 And Some Other Bosniaks.....................................................................................63 The Battle of Kosovo, the Film ..............................................................................70 Torso ......................................................................................................................73 Epic for fun ............................................................................................................74 The Battle of Kosovo..............................................................................................76 Proverbial Use of the Epic, Fallen Members of the Family, and Guilt .................92 How to Remember and Forget Almasa and Zijneta.............................................103 Chapter 3: Who is that Speaking?: Microhistory of the Utterance.................................115 She, the Animator.................................................................................................116 Mazuranic, Cengic, and the bards’ voices, the Author ........................................130 She, the Figure.....................................................................................................131 Interpretive Frameworks of the Participants—Mothers and Daughters ..............136 The Cumbersome Question of Origins ................................................................140 ix SECTION II: EVERYDAY LIFE STORIES ..................................................................144 Chapter 4: Watching, Singing, and Smoking...................................................................147 Watching Interrupted...........................................................................................152 Bogami ja komunista!: Ado and the Pioneers......................................................160 Islamization of Bosnia and Singing Ilahije..........................................................165 Chapter 5: Finding a Repairman in Sarajevo: The Mundane Life of Taking Care of Things and the Community in Post-war Bosnia.........................171 Chapter 6: Golubar, Tetak (Pigeon-man, the Uncle): Neglected Registers of Belonging ......................................................................186 Chapter 7: The Ticklish Imperial Aura and Cumbersome Summertime Travels ............198 Imperial aura........................................................................................................206 Cumbersome Summertime Travels......................................................................214 Chapter 8: Countryside Scenes and Numbers about Bosnia............................................218 Chapter 9: On the Radio: Accented Sounds of Displacement, Longing,