Sarajevo With the breakup of Yugoslavia and the establishment of Bosnian and Herzegovinian sovereignty in 1992, the renaming of the streets in Sarajevo was part of the deliberate strategy to break away from Socialist ideals and heritage, thus creating a specifically Bosnian history. All the old, ‘negative’ associations were replaced by names deemed to be more acceptable as part of a deliberate reshaping of this particular aspect of place. Through a selective reconstruction of Bosnian history to appease contemporary nationalist aspirations, there was a conscious invoking of a collective memory of both distant and recent events to enhance group identity.
The nationalistic renaming of streets in Sarajevo reflects the Commission’s strong desire, on behalf of the city’s inhabitants, to establish an identity that can contribute to development of a more secure basis for self-government and territorial integrity. Building a new national narrative that highlights the differences between Bosnia and its neighbouring states has emphasised the nation as specifically consisting of Bosnian Muslims, whose awareness of their own distinctive heritage is differentiated from Bosnian Croats and Bosnian Serbs. The same is true in East Sarajevo, where the Serbian national narrative has been hardened. The inevitable inconsistencies in historical narratives and political ideologies between the two parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina makes one question the relationships between ‘state’ and ‘nation’, especially within the context of the former Yugoslavia.
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on site review 42: atlas :: being in place
:: urban matters
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