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Debate ∵
Kristen Ghodsee, Muslim Lives in Eastern Europe: Gender, Ethnicity, and the Transformation of Islam in Postsocialist Bulgaria (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009): a Comment
Ilia Iliev Department of Ethnology, St. Kliment Ohridski University, Sofia, Bulgaria [email protected]
Received 6 December 2013
After being long neglected by American anthropology, Bulgaria has provided ethnographic material for several recent monographs by Barbara Cellarius, Donna Buchanan, Gerald Creed, Mary Neuburger, and Yuson Jung. Kristen Ghodsee, in her book Muslim Lives in Eastern Europe, engages in dialogue with these authors and other European and American scholars on topics such as post-socialist changes in Bulgaria and Eastern Europe, the introduc- tion of new forms of Islam, and the renegotiation of gender roles. Her argu- ments are based on thorough and meticulous ethnographic work on Pomak (Bulgarian-speaking Muslims) urban communities in the central parts of the Rodopi Mountains in the region of Madan. The region is situated near the Bul- garian border with Greece and Turkey and presents an ethnic mix of Christian Bulgarians, Pomaks, Roma, and ethnic Turks. It was a favorite target for the modernization and industrialization policies of socialist Bulgaria, and suffered particularly badly from the deindustrialization following the end of commu- nism. The ethnic variety in Central Rodopi, the mosaic of traditional rural communities with newly grown urban settlements inhabited by uprooted workers from all parts of Bulgaria, and the intensive exchanges across a bor- der that used to separate the Warsaw Pact and nato – and now the European
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Union Schengen core (Greece) and its recently acquired periphery (Bulgaria) and Turkey – has recently attracted international anthropologists like Assen Balikci, Barbara Cellarius, Ulf Brunnbauer, and Evangelos Karagiannis, as well as many local ethnologists. Kristen Ghodsee’s contribution to this growing work is particularly valuable, given her blend of critical distance and excellent knowledge of local specifici- ties. The first chapters in her book present a detailed overview of the current discussions on the Pomak minority, a group of Bulgarian-speaking Muslims whose identity is disputed between Bulgaria, Turkey, Greece, and an imaginary Arab or Muslim community. Following this she presents a history of Madan, a small town built around zinc and lead mines in Central Rodopi Mountain and the neighboring settlements, which were targeted by various industrialization, urbanization and resettlement policies under communism. The miners were recruited both among local Pomaks and Christian Bulgarians from more distant areas, which was done in order to modify the ethnic mix in the region. These men were praised as the core of the working class, supposedly ruling through the mediation of the Bulgarian Communist Party, and their position was both prestigious and well remunerated. After the fall of communism, however, most of the mines were closed, their equipment was sold for a song to ‘strategic in- vestors’ who hastened to resell it, and the proud miners became unemployed. Moreover, the educated urban public showed little compassion and tended to react frostily to the miners’ strikes, which were considered as unfashionable as the working class itself. Kristen Ghodsee also discusses in detail the situation of the Muslim denomination in Bulgaria, where two rival grand muftis have been competing for legitimacy and resources, and she goes on to talk about the ar- rival of a new type of preachers who received training mostly in Arab countries and advocate a more literal application of the Koran. Following this she has a brilliant chapter demonstrating how local men and women embrace these new forms of Islam as a new way of expressing their gender identities, or as a way of curbing their alcohol abuse or diminishing domestic violence.
The Rise and Fall of Orthodox Islam in Madan
The book presents a skillful overview of the particular ethnic blend in the Madan area, where the Pomaks live in a predominantly Christian Bulgarian nation-state near compact Turkish communities, not far from the Greek and Turkish borders. Kristen Ghodsee argues that with the local Turkish communi- ties being rather lukewarm in their religious practices, and Bulgarians being
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