Balkan Fascination

Penulis: Mirjana Lausevic
Penerbit: Oxford University Press
Tebal halaman: 299
ISBN: 019517867X, 9780195178678

Buku ini terbagi ke dalam empat bagian, yang secara garis besar membahas tentang periode-periode sejarah perkembangan tarian rakyat internasional. Bagian I, "Ethnography of the Balkan Music Scene", memuat tentang profil masyarakat Balkan era kekinian dan tentang perkemahan-perkemahan Balkan sebagai pusat perkembangan tarian. Bagian II, "Folk Dancing and Turn-of-the-Century America", membahas tentang berbagai kegunaan tarian rakyat di daerah permukiman dan bagi pendidikan jasmani dan rekreasi. Bagian III, "International Dancing Folk Dancing from the 1930s to 1950s", memperbincangkan munculnya gerakan independen "tarian rakyat internasional". Bagian IV, "The 1950s and Beyond", membicarakan tentang "Balkan craze" tarian rakyat internasional dan perkembangan lebih lanjut dari musik dan tarian khas Balkan.

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Macedonia

Authors: Harvey Pekar, Heather Roberson, Ed Piskor

Publisher: Villard, 2007

ISBN 0345498992, 9780345498991

161 pages

For years Heather Roberson, a passionate peace activist, has argued that war can always be avoided. But she has repeatedly faced counterarguments that fighting is an inescapable consequence of world conflicts. Indeed, Heather finds proving her point to be a little tricky without examples to bolster her case. So she does something a little crazy: She sets out for far-off Macedonia, a landlocked country north of Greece and west of Bulgaria, to explore a region that has edged–repeatedly–close to the brink of violence, only to refrain.

In the process–and as vividly portrayed by the talented duo of Harvey Pekar and Ed Piskor–Heather is tangled in red tape, ripped off by cabdrivers and hotel clerks, hit on by creepy guys, secretly photographed, and mistaken for a spy. She also creates unlikely friendships, learns that getting lost means seeing something new, and makes some startling discoveries. War is hell and peace is difficult–but conflict is always necessary.

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Macedonia: Warlords and Rebels in the Balkans

Author: John Phillips

Publisher: I.B.Tauris, 2004

230 pages

The former Yugoslav republic's smooth transition to independence contrasted impressively with the violent succession of Slovenia, Croatia and bosnia. A decade ago, the preoccupation of western journalists' with Bosnia and Croatia meant that events in Macedonia received scant mention.

When the author returned to the Balkans to report on the demise of Slobodan Milosevic in September 2000, it was expected that any further fighting that broke out in the former Yugoslavia would most likely take place in Montenegro. The ousting of Milosevic in a bloodless uprising curtailed the tension between Beograd and Milo Djukanovic, the Montenegrin Leader, but as fighting flared with between ethnic Albanians and Yugoslav soldiers in southern Serbia it became clear not only that NATO's bombing of Yugoslavia had not resolved the status of Kosovo but also that Albanian nationalism was now potentially as much a major destabilising force in the region as Serbian nationalism had been hitherto.

This book attempts to explain how and why armed conflict broke out in Macedonia, threatening to plunge the Balkans into a fifth war a decade after Skopje seceded peacefully from Yugoslavia.

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