Keywords
religion and nationalism
descent
Serbian Orthodox Church
Islamic Community
How to Cite
Abstract
This article examines how religious institutions in Bosnia and Herzegovina transform faith into ethnonational belonging by linking religion with ancestry. Focusing on the Serbian Orthodox Church and the Islamic Community between 2015 and 2025, it argues that institutional religious discourse reframes religious identity as inherited rather than chosen. Drawing on constructivist and post-structuralist approaches, the study conceptualizes descent not as biological fact but as a narrative effect produced through language, symbolism, and repetition. Through comparative discourse analysis of sermons, epistles, and public statements, the article identifies three mechanisms: the construction of the community as a transgenerational moral organism, the sacralization of territory as inherited space, and the mobilization of narratives of suffering and martyrdom that bind present generations to ancestral obligation. These strategies naturalize ethnonational boundaries by embedding them in morally authoritative and emotionally resonant frameworks, making alternative forms of belonging more difficult to sustain. By foregrounding the role of religious institutions in the ethnicization of identity, the article contributes to debates on nationalism, religion, and the durability of ethnopolitical divisions in post-conflict societies
References
Ahmed, S. (2004). The cultural politics of emotion. Edinburgh University Press.
Anderson, B. (1983). Imagined communities: Reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism. Verso.
Assmann, J. (1995). Collective memory and cultural identity. New German Critique, (65), 125–133.
Barth, F. (1969). Ethnic groups and boundaries: The social organization of culture difference. Little, Brown.
Billig, M. (1995). Banal nationalism. Sage.
Bringa, T. (1995). Being Muslim the Bosnian way: Identity and community in a central Bosnian village. Princeton University Press.
Brubaker, R. (2004). Ethnicity without groups. Harvard University Press.
Campbell, D. (1998). Writing security: United States foreign policy and the politics of identity (Rev. ed.). University of Minnesota Press.
Chandra, K. (2012). Constructivist theories of ethnic politics. Oxford University Press.
Fairclough, N. (1995). Critical discourse analysis: The critical study of language. Longman.
Hall, S. (1996). Who needs “identity”? In S. Hall & P. du Gay (Eds.), Questions of cultural identity (pp. 1–17). Sage.
Hansen, L. (2006). Security as practice: Discourse analysis and the Bosnian war. Routledge.
Iveković, V. (2002). Nationalism and the political use and abuse of religion. Social Compass, 49(4), 523–536.
Juergensmeyer, M. (1993). The new cold war? Religious nationalism confronts the secular state. University of California Press.
Neumann, I. B. (1999). Uses of the other: “The East” in European identity formation. University of Minnesota Press.
Perica, V. (2002). Balkan idols: Religion and nationalism in Yugoslav states. Oxford University Press.
Sells, M. (1996). The bridge betrayed: Religion and genocide in Bosnia. University of California Press.
Smith, A. D. (1999). Myths and memories of the nation. Oxford University Press.
Wendt, A. (1999). Social theory of international politics. Cambridge University Press.
Yuval-Davis, N. (1997). Gender and nation. Sage.
Islamic Community in Bosnia and Herzegovina. (2015–2025). Hutbas, speeches, and official statements. Retrieved from https://www.islamskazajednica.ba
Serbian Orthodox Church. (2015–2025). Christmas and Easter epistles, sermons, and official statements. Retrieved from https://www.spc.rs