Public Expressions of Bosnian Muslim Religiosity and Lived Faith: The Cases of Friday Prayer and Hijab

Abstract

The last few decades of Islamic life in Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH) have been described as a revival, in which Islam has become more visible, active and accessible, in great part due to the changes to the Bosnian Muslims’ ‘collective’ identity and the threat to their survival during the recent war. BiH’s Muslims have evolved as a group from members of the majority in the four centuries of Ottoman rule to a distinct minority ethnic group (distinguished by their religion) under the Habsburg regime, and eventually became a constituent nation in the plurinational Yugoslavia. The 20th century communist Yugoslav policy of marginalizing religion meant that Muslim believers remained part of society, but they tended to take a civic-oriented or ‘secular’ stance toward ‘others’. While Islam in this time was, for the majority, ‘boiled down to a vague cultural affiliation which had almost lost its practical elements’ (H. Karčić 2011), the 1990s war brought an increased incentive to fortify the character and traditions of the group, Islam being the most essential. A presumed Muslim identity made numerous residents targets of aggression and violence, causing many to assume this identity more securely and explore its meaning, while others experienced existential crises through which they found spiritual answers in Islam.