HSEM104 Tolerance and Intolerance: Muslims, Christians and Jews in South-Eastern Europe
Annotation:
• Combining the macro-historical with the micro-historical approaches, the course examines the inter-relations between the three main ethno-religious groups – Christians, Muslims and Jews – in South-Eastern Europe from a long-term perspective, from Ottoman times to the present.
• It focuses on the building through the centuries of a specific model of coexistence between these communities in the region including contacts and conflicts as well as many mutual influences and interchanges.
• Issues such as religious conversion in South-Eastern Europe, the impact of the image of “the other” as well as of the economic and political developments in the region on inter-relations, different manifestations of tolerance and intolerance will be discussed. The question to what extend this historical background and experience of co-existence could be important nowadays will be also considered.
Lecturers:
Prof. Rumen Genov, PhD
Assoc. Prof. Svetla Yaneva, PhD
Course Description:
Competencies:
• The students are acquainted with the most relevant literature and research in the field, with the different approaches to the specific topics discussed in the course and with the current historiographical debates on them.
• The students improve their abilities of analysis and interpretation of different primary and secondary sources as well as their skills of written and oral presentations.
Prerequisites:
• English language proficiency
• Background in Humanities or related field
Types:
Full-time Programmes
Types of Courses:
Lecture
Language of teaching:
English
Topics:
- The status of the ethno-religious and confessional groups in South-Eastern Europe, 15th – 19th c.: the Ottoman millet system
- The religious institutions in South-Eastern Europe, 15th – 18th c.
- Religious conversion in South-Eastern Europe, 15th – 19th c.
- Political and economic aspects of the contacts and conflicts between Christians, Muslims and Jews in South-Eastern Europe in Ottoman times
- Cross-cultural influences and inter-changes between Christians, Muslims and Jews in South-Eastern Europe in Ottoman times
- The image of “the other” in texts and folklore
- The everyday life experiences of co-existence of Christians, Muslims and Jews in South-Eastern Europe, 15th – 19th c.
- Discriminatory policies toward the minorities in the early-20th century
- Ethnic cleansing and exchange of population during and after World War I
- Refugee waves and their settlement
- The League of Nations and the minorities problems
- Anti-Semitism and Holocaust in South-Eastern Europe during World War II: Destruction and saving the Jews
- National homogeneity, assimilation of minorities and tolerance
- The ethno-confessional conflicts in post-Communist South-Eastern Europe and tolerance
- The traditions of co-existence of Christians, Muslims and Jews in South-Eastern Europe in their continuity
Bibliography:
Adanir, F., S. Faroqhi (eds.) The Ottomans and the Balkans. A discussion of historiography. Leiden-Boston-Koln, 2002.
Adanir, F., The tolerant and the grim: the Ottoman legacy in Southeastern Europe. – In: Culture and reconciliation in Southeastern Europe. Thessaloniki, 1998, 107-199.
Barouh, E. Jews in the Bulgarian lands. Ancestral memory and historical destiny. Sofia, 2001.
Braude, B. and B. Lewis. Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Empire. The Functioning of a Plural Society. New York-London, 1982.
Braude, B. Foundation Myths of the Millet System – In: Braude, B., B. Lewis. Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Empire. The Functioning of a Plural Society. New York-London, 1982, vol. I., 69-88.
Clogg, R. (ed) Balkan society in the age of the Greek independence. London, 1981.
Emmanuel, E. S. Histoire des Israelites de Salonique. Paris, 1936.
Genov, R., I. Baeva, “Incomprehension of the Nature of the Race Question”: Saving the Bulgarian Jews from the Holocaust. - Racial discrimination and ethnicity in European history. Edit. G. Halfdanarson. Edizioni Plus, Universita di Pisa, 2003.
Goffman, D. Ottoman Millets in the Early Seventeenth Century. – New Perspectives on Turkey, 1994, II, 133-158.
Greene, M. A shared world: Christians and Muslims in the Early modern Mediterranean. Princeton, 1999.
Jennings, R., Christians and Muslims in Ottoman Cyprus and the Mediterranean world, 1571-1640 (New York and London: New York University Press, 1993)
Keren, Z. On the history of the Jewish community in Vidin. – Etudes Balkaniques, 33/1, 1996, 80-87.
Kitromilides, P. Orthodox culture and collective identity in the Ottoman Balkans during the eighteenth century. – Oriente Moderno, anno XVIII (LXXIX), 1999, 131-145.
Levi, A. (ed) The Jews of the Ottoman Empire. Princeton, 1994.
Michailidis, I. D. National Identity versus Minority Language. The Greek and Bulgarian Experience in the 20th century. - In: Language and identities in historical perspective /edited by Ann Katherine Isaacs. Pisa: Edizioni Plus. Universita di Pisa, 2005.
Minkov, A. Conversion to Islam in the Balkans. Kisve bahas? petitions and Ottoman social life, 1670–1730. Leiden–Boston, 2004.
Nielsen, J. (ed.) Religion, ethnicity and contested nationhood in the former Ottoman space. Leiden–Boston, 2012.
Norris, H. Т. Islam on the Balkans. Religion and society between Europe and the Arab world. Columbia, 1993.
Pentzopoulos D., The Balkan Exchange of Minorities and its Impact upon Greece, Mouton 1962.
Skran C., Refugees in Inter-War Europe. The Emergence of a Regime, New York 1995.
Thornberry P., International Law and the Rights of Minorities, Oxford 1992.
Todorova, M. The Ottoman legacy in the Balkans – In: Brown, L. C. (ed) Imperial legacy: The Ottoman imprint on the Balkans and the Middle East. New York, 1995.
Todorova, O. The nineteenth-century Bulgarians “perception” of the Jews. – Etudes balkaniques, 3-4, 1995, 30-51.
Zhelyazkova, A. The penetration and adaptation of Islam in Bosnia from the fifteenth to the nineteenth century. – Journal of Islamic Studies 5, 1994, 187-208.
Zhelyazkova, A., J. Nielsen, G. Kepell (eds) Relations of compatibility and incompatibility between Christians and Muslims in Bulgaria, Sofia, 1995.