Balkan. Somewhere between a tragedy and a myth, a place and a condition,                  the term is perhaps best understood as a metaphor. It has been used and abused in                  academia by proponents of opposing political views. Multiculturalism has                  appropriated it, as have postmodernism and postcommunism. It is used pejoratively to                  refer to excessive specialization and nostalgically to refer to Europe's lost people                  -- its wild warriors and passionate geniuses. This book explores the idea of the                  Balkan as metaphor and the meaning of Balkan identity in the context of contemporary                  culture. Focusing on Balkanism both as a body of knowledge and as the critical study                  of that discourse, this book does for the Balkans what Edward Said's Orientalism did                  for "the Orient."The sixteen authors, most of whom were born and educated in the                  Balkans, apply the Western academic tools of postmodernism, poststructuralism,                  deconstruction, psychoanalysis, and critical multiculturalism to topics as varied as                  the rhetoric of Balkanization, the war in Kosovo, Western demonization and                  erotization of the Serbs, Balkan film, human rights legislation, Byzantinism, the                  vampire as an image of Balkan violence, envy of the political and moral capital of                  victimhood, the tendency of the Balkan psyche toward depression, Serbian machismo                  and homosexuality, and wartime rape. The book both lays the groundwork for a new                  field of study and serves as an act of resistance against the many forms of                  representation that break the Balkans into fragments such as NATO army bases and                  digital maps in order to wire them into the global market.

Balkan as Metaphor: Between Globalization and Fragmentation PDF

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