Postwar Life-Space and Music in Bosnia-Herzegovina
File version
Author(s)
Griffith University Author(s)
Primary Supervisor
Other Supervisors
Editor(s)
Claire Freeman; Paul TranterTracey Skelton
Date
Size
File type(s)
Location
License
Abstract
War and violent conflict can alter the physical and social living space available to young people in post-conflict societies in multiple ways. Ethnic partition of the geographical space – an increasingly common characteristic of postwar landscapes – further restricts the environment, creating the phenomenon of the divided city and enforcing rigid social and political norms that enshrine ethnicity as the primary form of identity across all spheres of public and private life. This chapter focuses on the divided city of Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and examines the way that one group of young people reclaimed the exploration of identity and the expansion of their constrained physical and social worlds through participation in music-making activities. It examines the self-reports of their experiences through the idea of “life space”, a concept most commonly found in gerontology but expanded in this study to encompass three dimensions – physical, inner, and social life space. The testimonies of former participants in the music activities form the primary data source. Data were gathered during a period of intensive ethnographic fieldwork in October–November 2013 and analyzed inductively and thematically. The relatively long retrospective view yielded findings that include the contributions that provision of diverse music activities made to the broad conflict stabilization and recovery effort, including goals concerned with peacebuilding and youth engagement. The provision of music and arts activities in a nonpolitical space were found to make a contribution to the maintenance of cultural alternatives in the city and the nurturing of a “capacity to aspire” among individuals, findings which have significance for locally driven development and the cultivation of more stable, tolerant societies.
Journal Title
Conference Title
Book Title
Risk, Protection, Provision and Policy
Edition
Volume
Issue
Thesis Type
Degree Program
School
Publisher link
Patent number
Funder(s)
Grant identifier(s)
Rights Statement
Rights Statement
Item Access Status
Note
Access the data
Related item(s)
Subject
Performing Arts and Creative Writing not elsewhere classified