When History Is a Nightmare : Lives and Memories of Ethnic Cleansing in Bosnia-Herzegovina (Paperback)

by Stevan M. Weine (Author) "If I had remained in my office at the psychiatric institute, they would never have come..." (more)
Key Phrases: surviving ethnic cleansing, psychiatric apologists, testimony psychotherapy, World War, Bosnian Muslims, Radovan Karadzic (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal
The title suggests that this is a journalistic account of the Bosnian war, but it is not. Weine, codirector of the Project on Genocide, Psychiatry, and Witnessing at the University of Illinois in Chicago, seeks to elucidate the complicated conflict by emphasizing the psychology of everyone involvedAincluding those responsible for making ethnic cleansing part of our vocabulary. Weine sums up his argument precisely when he quotes from UlyssesA"History is a nightmare from which I'm trying to awake"Asaying that the core problem lies in the inability of the Balkan peoples to deal with history in the right way. Weine's attempt is admirable and sincere, but as an outsider he fails to see how intricate the conflict really is; it is severely stereotypical to assert that the post-World War II years were essentially about suppressing bitterness and hatreds. In addition, he neglects the crucial question of why so many were unable and unwilling to distinguish between their nationality and religion. Nevertheless, chapters on the leaders of the recent genocide in Bosnia are particularly interesting, and those with little knowledge of the conflict will find this accessible introductory work helpful.AMirela Roncevic, "Library Journal"
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review
"A profoundly human book, with a keen ear for the story, and an open heart to convey its depth. Stevan Weine attempts to weave history, human rights, psychology, anthropology, and creative arts into a new perspective on what genocide does to the lives of its survivors and to their culture." -- Yael Danieli, editor, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Fifty Years and Beyond

"A remarkable book. Everybody ought to read this panoramic view of the tragedy of Bosnia." -- Ervin Staub, author, The Roots of Evil

"Through his skillful empathic listening and eloquent writing, Stevan Weine conveys the magnitude of the horrors, the dreadful consequences of man's inhumanity to man." -- Jerrold M. Post, M.D. co-author, Political Paranoia: The Psychopolitics of Hatred

"Weine's history, based on survivors' testimonies, produces a story with human faces that is more capable of helping us to fulfill promises that so many Holocaust claims of 'Never again!' Bosnians will be grateful for this book." -- Tvrtko Kulenovic, University of Sarajevo, and former president of P.E.N Bosnia-Herzogovina

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Product Details

• Paperback: 259 pages
• Publisher: Rutgers University Press (August 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813526760
• ISBN-13: 978-0813526768
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,329,109 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a powerful, impressionistic account of the Balkan horrors, January 31, 2001

By	Christopher Robertson "ctr" (St. Louis, MO United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: When History Is a Nightmare : Lives and Memories of Ethnic Cleansing in Bosnia-Herzegovina (Hardcover)

Weine's book is by no means narrow in its subject-matter. He touches on: inter-ethnic marriage, criticisms of the United Nations, memory as a ground for social morality, the challenges of refugees in America, the construction of psychoses, the social deification of doctors, urbanism, the identity of Europe and the Balkans, the impact of communist cultural censorship, fundamentalism, the social responsibilities of psychiatrists, the need for a permanent UN war crimes court, and discontinuities in the lifepaths of trauma survivors. Any one of these issues could have been the topic for his relatively short 230 page book. But together, they paint a picture of the multifaceted chaos that is ethnic conflict. We get the sense that nothing here is simple, that everything is interconnected, and that the ethnic cleansing is not a psychiatric, geographic, military, or political issue, but fundamentally a human problem of persons.

So if you are looking for a deep and careful study of the psychological issues that afflict ethnic cleansing survivors, then I suppose that this book is not your source. If you want, on the other hand, a compelling and touching tour through a recent crisis of human history and a casual chat with a knowledgeable, connected, and compassionate person,then Stevan Weine's book is the perfect choice...END