Balkan Academic Book Review 2/2001
________________________________________

Ger Duijzings. Religion and the Politics of Identity in Kosovo. London:
Hurst & Company, 2000. 238pp., 2 maps, 14 black and white photos. 16.50
GBP. ISBN 1 85065 431X (paperback).

Reviewed by Isa Blumi (New York University). Email: ngapeja@...
_________________________________________

This book, rather a collection of loosely related essays, represents an
important first step towards disentangling what the modern nation-state and
all its institutionalized mythologies have confused, erased, desecrated and
demolished over the last one hundred years. Ger Duijzings, a Dutch-trained
anthropologist whose work in Kosova began late in the 1980s, represents a
new generation of social scientist who clearly has good inter-disciplinary
instincts. Actually, this is not a book in the classic sense, as suggested
by the author himself. The author proposes that the seven case studies are
really only linked by a concern over the "tension between conflict and
symbiosis...and the role played by religion in the local, regional and
national politics of identity" (x). Herein lies the problem with this work.
There has been far too little effort to compose a coherent, interrelated
narrative that deals with a very important issue to our understanding of
Balkan history and current events. The rare occasion when these chapters
actually speak to each other does not do enough to justify reading this
collection as anything other than just that, a collection of separate
essays that vary dramatically in methodology and quality.

That I have to resort to critiquing seven separate chapters is all rather
disappointing since the ambitions here are of great value. The introduction
itself is an excellent example of a critical reading of the events and
tensions that plagued Kosova over the last hundred years. The central
premise that Kosova is not a simple case of irreconcilably distinct
communities but a complex, historically informed interchange between
loosely defined "communities" on the basis of loosely defined notions of
religious, linguistic and/or ethnic identity. This is must reading for all
undergraduate and graduate students. I equally recommend educators of all
colorations to include this introductory chapter in their reading lists.
The assertions that Kosova's population has a long history of sharing
cultural traits which includes language, religious rites and spatial
identifications will go a long way in dispelling the more crude fixations
most authors of the Balkans like to assert. That Duijzings so intently
tries to demonstrate cross-cultural contact taking place in a number of
localities is indicative of how much the notion that "Serbs" "Albanians"
and "Roma" are distinct and largely antagonistic groups dominate the
literature. I applaud Duijzings’ intentions. It is about time that such
over-simplifications be put in their theoretical and empirical place, the
garbage bin. Unfortunately, it is only now that ethnographers and social
scientists such as Duijzings have reached the productive stage of their
careers where they can actually produce articulate challenges to these
dangerous myths. Duijzings’ introduction, therefore, is most welcome and by
in large a finely argued piece. It provided for much excitement in this
reader and after reading it, I was expecting something of similar thrust
for the rest of the book.

Unfortunately, things did not turn out that way. For one, it is clear that,
chronologically, the introduction was the last thing he wrote for this
collection. The pieces beyond the introduction go back twelve years in some
cases therefore, the sophistication and intellectual maturity exhibited in
the introduction is lacking in much that follows. The underlying problem
with the entire collection is with the methodological approach that seems
to often favor a dependence on an unreliable body of secondary literature
rather than a healthy combination of critical reading and extensive
fieldwork. This is strange since Duijzings (at least in the introduction)
goes to such great lengths to articulate to the reader a dynamic at play in
Kosova wholly at odds with what much of the literature of the past seeks to
promote. Inexplicably, the case studies themselves, with the exception of
his work on Kosova's Croat/Catholic community, are largely based on
empirical research and not the myth-breaking evidence from the field for
which I was hoping.

My own suspicion is that this is a testament to the problems Kosova
experienced in the 1990s. Duijzings’ ambitious project probably suffered
from the accelerated bifurcation of Kosova during the Milosevic period.
There is, as a result, a major difference in quality of presentation and
argument among the case studies, largely due to the fact that Duijzings was
only able to do extensive field work in just one case, at the beginning of
the Milosevic era. In that case, we get a relatively straightforward
ethnographic study of the Catholic/Croat community in Letnica in the second
chapter (37-64), which served as an interesting example of how integrated
and cross-sectional Kosova's population actually was before the resurgence
of Serb nationalism in the late-1980s. That Duijzings follows members of
this community to their ultimate resettlement in Croatia provides him the
ethnographic evidence to support his thesis on identity mobility. This
backdrop as a result, positively enriches Duijzings' much appreciated
secondary research which results in a, if not on the whole confused, at
least nuanced piece of history-writing on the Albanian crypto-Catholic
community in neighboring Stublla (Chap. 4). The minor historical issues I
have about the 19th century Catholic Church in Kosova aside, I think
Duijzings is at his best when he is informed by his own field work and then
incorporates (hopefully in the future with more critical reading) and not
depends on secondary literature.

I fear that with the exception of a few cursory examples of actual
fieldwork, the rest of his case studies rely far too much on this
problematic methodology of referencing previously published materials. The
cases in which Muslim Roma visited the Orthodox monastery at Gracanica, for
example, was based on what can only be called passive observation. Chapter
three, therefore, is a missed opportunity and unrewarding. It is clear from
Duijzings' analytical style and his earlier work in Letnica that counting
heads and taking touristy snap shots of subjects is not what the author
himself would consider good ethnography. Again, I am sympathetic to the
difficulties Duijzing faced. The unfortunate realities of the 1990s
certainly, by force of the nature of identity politics alone, changed
dramatically Duijzings' study. But his attempt to compensate, for example
with the case of the "Egyptians" in Milosevic-era Yugoslavia (and
Macedonia)-Chap 6-as well as his other example of shared religious sites in
Zociste, in Rahovac Central Kosova, fails to break new ground. In the last
two chapters, Duijzings even attempts a comparative textual analysis of
what he asserts are Albanian and Serb examples of how religious symbolism
infiltrate “national” imaginations. For the record, I am fully unconvinced
one could take Naim Frasheri’s epic reproduction of the Battle of Kerbela,
entitled Qerbelaja (Chap. 7) and situate it on comparative grounds with a
post-war, state produced body of literature that recreates, and embellishes
the Battle of Kosovo mythology in Serbia (Chap. 8). This is not the place
to try to debate this issue but I think the last two chapters are
indicative of a general pattern of this book. That is, the poor
incorporation of chapters that do not speak to each other beyond the vague
assumption that we are talking, in some way or another, about
identity-formation using the symbolism of religion.

To tell the story of Kosova where no longer the conditions permit for such
a thesis to be studied on the ground is what Duijzings attempts to do with
far little success. He tries to does this, and here is where he is most at
fault, by reading secondary sources (in the case of Stublla an interesting
group of Catholic Church manuscripts which he does not properly cite).
After sifting through this body of work Duijzings then tries to force the
material to fit his (in my view) correct suspicions about the nature of
identity. Unfortunately, this over-reliance on the work of both respected
Balkan commentators such as Hasluck and Malcolm and veritable hacks is
unhealthy. Firstly, while I appreciate and respect their contributions,
much of Malcolm and Hasluck's work in respect to the subjects Duijzings
uses them for are based on secondary literature. Being that much of their
sources are problematic from the perspective of this Ottoman historian
suggests the foundations of much of the rather important assertions made by
Duijzings are equally vulnerable to criticism. To assume authority on the
basis of making unsubstantiated statements is a dangerous trap that
Duijzings clearly understands, only I sense he is at a loss as to how to
rectify the problem of sources. Hasluck and Malcolm produced some of the
more professional secondary resources one could hope to use for Kosova and
I wholly support their being cited. On the other hand, they should not
provide the analytical foundation to what is ultimately an attempt to
historicize a phenomenon that is difficult to monitor anthropologically
today. Duijzings is rightfully seeking to set new paths, therefore he
should avoid redecorating old ones.

It is here that Duijzings’ scholarship runs into trouble because he not
only relies on Hasluck and Malcolm, but cites heavily local
publications--from period pieces, to periodicals to post-1986 Serb "social
science"--which makes the reading of these case studies all terribly
frustrating. Frustrating because Duijzings uses quite often these
politically charged and in my mind, useless propaganda, to substantiate
realities that are central to his argument. I refer in particular to his
rather weak contribution on the "Egyptians of Yugoslavia" where Duijzings
often references a blatantly biased body of literature (if we can call it
that) that emanated from Belgrade since 1990. Citing more often than health
permits the dribble of such nationalists as Rade Bozovic, Lazovic, Petrovic
and Prokic, all of whom contributed to state propaganda on “Egyptians”
after 1990, reflects a dangerous process of legitimizing "points of view"
when they are in fact scandalously false and contrived. Duijzings himself
is far too careful to outwardly subscribe to the premise of these theories
that render half of Kosova's population Roma and the other half Serb by
"ethnic" origin (i.e. the Albanians do not make up the majority population
in Kosova). Nevertheless, by incorporating this material so heavily into
the content, the impact on his analysis gets blurred and confused. For
instance, Duijzings is unforgivably comfortable with concluding that
"Egyptians and/or Roma" claim of association to one "ethno-religious" group
or another in order to receive certain social and economic favors.
(150-153) That sounds like a complicit adoption of the Belgrade line of the
1990s, namely, the majority of “Albanians” of Kosova are really Roma who
were coerced into claiming an Albanian identity in the 1981 census due to
pressures leveled by some unidentified Albanian political and economic elite.

With all due respect to anyone who finds this "plausible," the line flies
in the face of realities in Kosova today as in the 1970s and 1980s,
demonstrating a rather surprising lack of critical engagement with this
issue on the part of the author. Firstly, it seems that Duijzings cannot
reconcile his thesis that communities are not as intact and
boundary-conscious as previously thought in Kosova with the logic emanating
from Belgrade that Kosovar Albanians were the hegemonic community in Kosova
since the 1960s that exploited and abused everyone else. There lies the
danger of adopting this flawed literature to contribute to the issue of
identity shifting and the politics of the census etc. for it implicitly
accepts the foundation, if not the content, of highly distorted suppositions.

For the record, Albanians in Kosova, as Duijzings' instincts should remind
him, were not a constitutive and monolithic group. Therefore, to suggest
“Albanians” collectively subscribed to an “agenda” to force “Serbs,” “Roma”
and since the 1990s, “Egyptians” to claim Albanian identity, is classic
nationalist mythology at its most dangerous. More importantly, “Albanians”
did not at any time in the period of Kosova's autonomous status in
Yugoslavia have the power to "coerce" others to "claim" ethnic/national
status other than their own. The pressures of assimilation that is so often
suggested by Serb fascists (especially Atanasije Urosevic who is all too
often referenced in this book with no qualification) are accusations that
have never been substantiated with documentary evidence and fly in the face
of history. As with much of this type of literature, these are assertions
made by people whose authority lie in their political allegiance to
nationalist projects. "Albanians" neither at the height of Ottoman rule nor
in the post-Rankovic period in Yugoslavia, had the necessary power to make
such remarkable demands. As the massacres of 1981 suggest, power in Kosova
rested not in Prishtina (and certainly not in the hands of some monolith we
can call "Albanians") but in Belgrade and the Communist Party. That
Duijzings so carelessly indulges a genre of nation and identity building
that has led to untold pain and suffering for so many people in the Balkans
is, to say the least, a major disappointment of this book. There are far
more productive and helpful ways of exploring the phenomenon of the modern
census and the motivations of individuals to adopt one particular identity
or another in that context instead of subscribing to charges of Albanian
"hegemony" and "genocide" during the 1970-1989.

Again, the unfortunate conditions for the author probably forced him to
resort more to using secondary resources than he would like. That said, one
would hope to see more introspection. It is clear that Duijzings is
potentially a major voice in the field and has made an important initial
contribution (in the introduction) to what is a much belated revision in
how we understand Balkan identities. There is no need to beat a dead horse
here but it strikes me as an important point to emphasize in this review
since Duijzings clearly deserves a place where he is considered an
"authority." I catch glimpses of a critical mind and qualified
anthropologist in this collection, therefore I am comfortable with
Duijzings' professional and intellectual aspirations. It is only hoped that
this heavy reliance on secondary material is quickly abandoned now that
conditions in the field have changed. I am sure events over the last year
will provide a golden opportunity for Duijzings to return to the field in
order that he ask the same questions in an equally, but now relatively
unrestricted, dynamic in Kosova. I expect the next book will be far more
focused and integrated, resulting in a satisfying intervention into what
Duijzings so rightly wishes to correct. In this book, despite a wonderful
conceptual foundation outlined in his introduction and his solid fieldwork
with Kosova's Croat/Catholic community in the early Milosevic period, his
reliance on secondary materials contradicted the analytical approach needed
to finish the task.
_________________________________________

This review was first published in Southeast European Politics, Vol. 1, no.
2 (December 2000), available at www.seep.ceu.hu
_________________________________________

© 2001 Balkan Academic News. This review may be distributed and reproduced
electronically, if credit is given to Balkan Academic News and the author.
For permission for re-printing, contact Balkan Academic News.