Description

The main objective of this research project is to acquire knowledge of the personal narratives of Bosniak women who permanently settled in Germany due to the Bosnian conflict in the 1990s. My focus is on how these women experience the tensions between the integration into a Western society and feelings of attachment to the country of origin. The war in Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1992-95 was the reason for many Bosniaks to flee the residues of former Yugoslavia. Almost two decades after the Dayton Peace Agreement was signed in 1995, thousands of Bosnian refugees still live outside their home country. Due to the political character and great complexity of the Bosniak identity, the migration of Bosnians has been and remains of particular interest for social scientists. Anthropological and historical studies have put the emphasis on the policies of communist regimes in order to explain the developments in Balkan Islam. Their efforts enable us to develop a better understanding of the specificities of the Bosniak group. The literature on the investigation of the integration experiences of women from the Bosniak Diaspora remains relatively marginal, especially considering the magnitude of migration from Bosnia. Women in particular are often portrayed as passive victims of their circumstances. I aspire to focus on this group and contribute to question this notion of victimization. Therefore, this research project aims to not only be an asset to the fields of migration and refugee studies, but also to provide valuable ethnographic material to the gendered integration discourse of Muslim women into Western European host societies.

Project Details

Project Type

Dissertation

Subject Group

Law, Economics and Social Sciences

Start

2016

Organization

Faculty/Central Institute

Berlin Graduate School Muslim Cultures and Societies

Institute/Seminar

Friedrich-Meinecke-Institut

Field/Work Area

Political Sciences/ Gender Research

Project Team

Director

Dr. Merima Šehagić

Researchers

• Dr. Merima Šehagić

  Former