Isa Blumi (born 1969, in Teplice, Czechoslovakia [1] ) is a historian. He is a senior lecturer and associate professor of Turkish Studies at Stockholm University Institute for Turkish Studies in Sweden. [2]
During the Kosovo conflict (1998–1999), Blumi was a member of the provisional Kosovo government. [3] [4] After the war, he worked as a consultant for the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) and the Organization for Security and Operation in Europe (OSCE). [3] Blumi completed an MA in Political Theory and Historical Studies at the New School for Social Research in New York, United States. [5] [6] [7] Studying in the History, Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies departments, Blumi graduated with a Ph.D. in 2005 from New York University. [8] [7] His dissertation focused on the complex interactions that Ottoman authorities and inhabitants of Ottoman Albania and Yemen had with each other, with Blumi visiting regional and national archives around the world for his research while he was a Fulbright-Hayes fellow being based in Istanbul. [6] [8] [9] Blumi also had a SSRC-IDRF (Social Science Research Council – International Dissertation Field Research Fellowship) fellowship for his Ph.D. research. [5] [9] Blumi became an assistant professor of Middle Eastern and Balkan history at Georgia State University in Atlanta, USA. [10] [11] During that time he was also a senior research fellow in the Centre for Area Studies at Leipzig University, Germany and a visiting professor of history at the American University of Sharjah, United Arab Emirates where his research focused on regional migration and its impact on host societies. [12] [3] [11]
Blumi has written more than two dozen articles. [5] [7] [10] They cover topics and focus on Ottoman rule in Albania and Yemen, migration patterns of Muslims in the Balkans to Western and Central Europe, south-eastern European history and current affairs, post First World War social history in Kosovo and Albania, the Kosovo crisis, and analysing issues relating to state centralisation and identity. [5] [7] [10] [13] His research interests include Balkan history, Political Islam, the Middle East/Persian Gulf/Red Sea regions and Muslim migration. [8] [10] [3] Blumi has favoured a multi-sited comparative and interdisciplinary approach toward his research that encompasses social history, post-colonial theory and analysis of state institutions as they evolved over time. [14] [15] His research has also entailed a transregional approach examining sociopolitical, cultural and economic exchanges, links and fragmentation in relation to collapsing political systems and the Ottoman Empire, Habsburg Empire and their transnational impacts on the Balkans and Balkan diasporas around the globe. [16] [17] [13] His other areas of research interest have included modern forms of Islam as practiced in the Balkans, Middle East, Eastern Africa and South-East Asia after the Second World War and nineteenth century Asian Muslim Emirates dealing with expanding European commercial interests within the South China Sea. [15] [13]
The Balkans, corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the whole of Bulgaria. The Balkan Peninsula is bordered by the Adriatic Sea in the northwest, the Ionian Sea in the southwest, the Aegean Sea in the south, the Turkish straits in the east, and the Black Sea in the northeast. The northern border of the peninsula is variously defined. The highest point of the Balkans is Musala, 2,925 metres (9,596 ft), in the Rila mountain range, Bulgaria.
This article includes information on the demographic history of Kosovo.
Isa Boletini was an Albanian revolutionary commander and politician and rilindas from Kosovo.
Sir Noel Robert Malcolm, is an English political journalist, historian and academic, currently a Senior Research Fellow at All Souls College, Oxford. A King's Scholar at Eton College, Malcolm read history at Peterhouse, Cambridge, and received his doctorate in history from Trinity College, Cambridge. He was a Fellow and College Lecturer of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, before becoming a political and foreign affairs journalist for The Spectator and the Daily Telegraph.
Islam is the second-largest religion in Europe after Christianity. Although the majority of Muslim communities in Western Europe formed recently, there are centuries-old Muslim communities in the Balkans, Caucasus, Crimea, and Volga region. The term "Muslim Europe" is used to refer to the Muslim-majority countries in the Balkans and parts of countries in Eastern Europe with sizable Muslim minorities that constitute large populations of indigenous European Muslims, although the majority are secular.
Kosovo was part of the Ottoman Empire from 1455 to 1912, at first as part of the eyalet of Rumelia, and from 1864 as a separate Kosovo Vilayet.
Islam in Kosovo has a long-standing tradition dating back to the Ottoman conquest of the Balkans. Before the Battle of Kosovo in 1389, the entire Balkan region had been Christianized by both the Western and Eastern Roman Empire. From 1389 until 1912, Kosovo was officially governed by the Muslim Ottoman Empire and a high level of Islamization occurred among Catholic and Orthodox Albanians, mainly due to Sufi orders and socio-political opportunism. Both Christian and Muslim Albanians intermarried and some lived as "Laramans", also known as Crypto-Christians. During the time period after World War II, Kosovo was ruled by secular socialist authorities in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY). During that period, Kosovars became increasingly secularized. After the end of Communist period religion had a revival in Kosovo. Today, 95.6% of Kosovo's population are Muslims, most of whom are ethnic Albanians. There are also non-Albanian speaking Muslims, who define themselves as Bosniaks, Gorani and Turks.
Albanian nationalism is a general grouping of nationalist ideas and concepts generated by ethnic Albanians that were first formed in the 19th century during the Albanian National Awakening. Albanian nationalism is also associated with similar concepts, such as Albanianism and Pan-Albanianism, that includes ideas on the creation of a geographically expanded Albanian state or a Greater Albania encompassing adjacent Balkan lands with substantial Albanian populations.
Muslim Romani people are people who are ethnically Roma and profess Islam. There are many different Roma groups and subgroups that predominantly practice Islam, as well as individual Romani people from other subethnic groups who have accepted Islam. Xoraxane Roma in Balkan Romani language, are non-Vlax Romani people, who adopted Sunni Islam of the Hanafi madhhab at the time of the Ottoman Empire. Some of them are Derviş of Sufism belief, and the biggest Tariqa of Jerrahi is located at the largest Arlije and Gurbeti Muslim Roma settlement in Europe in Šuto Orizari, locally called Shutka in North Macedonia have their own Romani Imam and the Muslim Roma in Šuto Orizari use the Quran in Balkan Romani language. Many Romanlar in Turkey, are members of the Hindiler Tekkesi a Qadiriyya-Tariqa, founded in 1738 by the Indian Muslim Sheykh Seyfullah Efendi El Hindi in Selamsız. Roma Muslims in Turkey and the Balkans are mostly cultural Muslims or nominal Muslims.
Albania–Turkey relations are foreign relations between Albania and Turkey. Albania has an embassy in Ankara and a general consulate in Istanbul. Turkey has an embassy in Tirana. The most widespread religion in Albania is Islam (~59%), also in Turkey (~90%). Both are part of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). In addition, they are full members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and Union for the Mediterranean (UfM). Turkey and Albania are candidates for accession in the European Union (EU).
Tosks are one of two major dialectal subgroups of Albanians differentiated by their cultural, linguistic, social and religious characteristics.
Papa Kristo Negovani, born Kristo Harallambi and also known as Kristo Negovani, was an Albanian national figure, priest, poet, teacher, writer and publisher.
Bregovina is a village in the municipality of Prokuplje, Serbia. According to the 2002 census, the village has a population of 70 people.
Turco-Albanian is an ethnographic, religious, and derogatory term used by Greeks for Muslim Albanians from 1715 and thereafter. In a broader sense, the term included both Muslim Albanian and Turkish political and military elites of the Ottoman administration in the Balkans. The term is derived from an identification of Muslims with Ottomans and/or Turks, due to the Ottoman Empire's administrative millet system of classifying peoples according to religion, where the Muslim millet played the leading role. From the middle of the nineteenth century, the term Turk and from the late nineteenth century onwards, the derivative term Turco-Albanian has been used as a pejorative term, phrase and or expression for Muslim Albanian individuals and communities. The term has also been noted to be unclear, ideologically and sentimentally charged, and an imperialist and racialist expression. Albanians have expressed derision and disassociation toward the terms Turk and its derivative form Turco-Albanian regarding the usage of those terms in reference to them. It has been reported that at the end of the 20th century some Christian Albanians still used the term "Turk" to refer to Muslim Albanians.
The All-Albanian Congress, Albanian National Congress, or Albanian Independence Congress was a held in Vlorë on November 28, 1912. Congress participants constituted the Assembly of Vlorë which established Albanian Provisional Government and elected Ismail Qemali as its president.
The Myth of Skanderbeg is one of the main constitutive myths of Albanian nationalism. In the late nineteenth century during the Albanian struggle and the Albanian National Awakening, Skanderbeg became a symbol for the Albanians and he was turned into a national Albanian hero and myth.
The expulsion of the Albanians, 1877–1878 refers to events of forced migration of Albanian populations from areas that became incorporated into the Principality of Serbia and Principality of Montenegro in 1878 after their initial expulsion from 1830–1876. These wars, alongside the larger Russo-Ottoman War (1877–78) ended in defeat and substantial territorial losses for the Ottoman Empire which was formalised at the Congress of Berlin. This expulsion was part of the wider persecution of Muslims in the Balkans during the geopolitical and territorial decline of the Ottoman Empire.
Serbian historiography refers to the historiography of the Serb people since the founding of Serbian statehood. The development can be divided into four main stages: traditional historiography, Ruvarac's critical school, Communist–Marxist legacy, and the renewed Serbian national movement.
The Islamization of Albania occurred as a result of the Ottoman conquest of the region beginning in 1385. The Ottomans through their administration and military brought Islam to Albania through various policies and tax incentives, trade networks and transnational religious links. In the first few centuries of Ottoman rule, the spread of Islam in Albania was slow and mainly intensified during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries due in part to greater Ottoman societal and military integration, geo-political factors and collapse of church structures. It was one of the most significant developments in Albanian history as Albanians in Albania went from being a largely Christian population to one that is mainly Sunni Muslim, while retaining significant ethnic Albanian Christian minorities in certain regions. The resulting situation where Sunni Islam was the largest faith in the Albanian ethnolinguistic area, but other faiths were also present in a regional patchwork, played a major influence in shaping the political development of Albania in the late Ottoman period. Apart from religious changes, conversion to Islam also brought about other social and cultural transformations that have shaped and influenced Albanians and Albanian culture.
Albanian nationalism emerged in Albania during the 19th century. By the late Ottoman period Albanians were mainly Muslims with close ties to the Ottoman Empire. The lack of previous Albanian statehood to draw upon resulted in Albanian nationalism developing later unlike neighbouring nationalisms of the Serbs and Greeks. The onset of the Eastern crisis (1870s) that threatened partition of Balkan Albanian inhabited lands by neighbouring Orthodox Christian states stimulated the emergence of the Albanian national awakening (Rilindja) and nationalist movement. During the 19th century, some Western scholarly influences, Albanian diasporas such as the Arbereshë and Albanian National Awakening figures contributed greatly to spreading influences and ideas among Balkan Albanians within the context of Albanian self-determination. Among those were ideas of an Illyrian contribution to Albanian ethnogenesis which still dominate Albanian nationalism in contemporary times and other ancient peoples claimed as ancestors of the Albanians, in particular the Pelasgians of which have been claimed again in recent times.