BOSNIAKS

“In Bosnia before the war, our children played in the streets and walked miles to school by themselves. Here, we have to watch them every minute or who knows what will happen. This is not freedom,” complained Adisa, a young Bosniak mother.

The historical term Bosniak has been resurrected (replacing Bosnian) to identify Slavic Muslims from the country now known as Bosnia-Herzegovina. Adisa’s distress resonates with her fellow Bosniaks throughout North America who were torn from their idyllic homeland where they had enjoyed the best lifestyle of any communist bloc country. Multi-ethnic Bosnia was home to Bosniaks, Serbs, and Croats who lived side by side in harmony for generations. However, it was the Bosniaks who suffered the most when Yugoslavia disintegrated during a series of ethnic and religious wars in the 1990s. Of the 100,000 people killed in the Bosnian War (1992-1995), 83% were Bosniak civilians, one-third of whom were women and children. During this time, Bosniaks were victims of unfathomable atrocities, including ethnic cleansing, systematic rape, and genocide.

North America offered refuge in the 1990s to many Bosniaks who had experienced significant trauma, including the death of family members, loss of home and possessions, torture, and abuse. Today, the Congress of North America Bosniaks represents an estimated 350,000 Americans and Canadians of Bosniak descent and origin, most of whom settled in the cities of the American Midwest.