Folklorism and Culture of Memory in Contemporary Bosnia and Herzegovina

Diverse aspects of folklorism in the countries of former Yugoslavia are a subject-matter of long-term ethnologic and folkloristic research. One of the important themes touches the relation between newly composed folk music (NCFM) and aggressive nationalistic propaganda, as well as further aspects of this genre. The NCFM is a genre of commercial music that developed in the former Yugoslavia from the 1960s and that refers to folk sources in its texts and musical construction. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, it was sevdalinka, a specific genre of urban music folklore, that have become one of NCFM sources. Sevdalinka has become one of the elements of the “orientalising” hetero-stereotypes of Bosniaks and Bosnian Muslim culture as the one that “essentially differs” from the cultures of other nations living in the former Yugoslavia. It has been insufficiently researched to date how the Bosniak collective memory is currently constructed through the NCFM. On an example of particular commemorative events, the study shows how a certain image of Bosniak history is created and supported by using the NCFM.