Muslim Slavs

Slavic ethnic groups who adhere to the Islamic faith

Mehmed Sokolović (1506-1579), Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire (1565-1579), one of the most notable Muslims of Slavic ethnicity.

Aladža Mosque in Foča, Bosnia and Herzegovina

Muslim Slavs or Slavic Muslims are ethnic groups or sub-ethnic groups of Slavs who are followers of Islam. The term is most often used in the study of the Balkans, Southeastern Europe, Caucasus, Crimea, and Volga region.[1][2][3] The majority of Slavic Muslims are found in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Kosovo, Montenegro, Bulgaria, and some republics of Russia.[1][2][3] Slavic Muslims can also be found in southern Serbia and North Macedonia.[4] Slavic Muslims are one among the indigenous ethnic groups who are native Europeans of the Islamic faith;[5] the others are the Muslim populations of Albanians, Greeks, Romani, Balkan Turks, Pomaks, Yörüks, Volga Tatars, and Crimean Tatars,[5] unlike the Muslims in Western Europe which are mostly non-European recent immigrants or the descendants of old immigrants.[6]

## Contents

* 1 South Slavic Muslims
* 2 See also
* 3 Notes
* 4 References
* 4.1 Bibliography
* 4.2 Further reading

## South Slavic Muslims[edit]

South Slavic Muslims can be divided in two main groups:

* South Slavic Muslims of Bulgaria: Muslim Bulgarians (or Pomaks);
* South Slavic Muslims of former Yugoslavia and its successor states, encompassing several ethnic groups and sub-groups (in alphabetical order):
* Bosniaks, by majority adherents of Islam; concentrated in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and also in Serbia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Croatia and Slovenia;
* Gorani people, a small ethnoreligious  community in Serbia, Kosovo,[a] Albania, and North Macedonia;
* Muslim Croats, adherents of Islam among Croats;
* Muslim Macedonians (or Torbeši), adherents of Islam among ethnic Macedonians;
* Muslim Serbs, adherents of Islam among Serbs;
* Muslims (ethnic group), one of six constitutive peoples in former Yugoslavia; since 1993 mainly opted to adopt ethnic Bosniak designation; remaining communities who kept previous designation are concentrated mainly in Serbia and Montenegro.

Ethnic Slavic Muslims in the Western Balkans follow Hanafi, a subcategory of Sunni Islam.[7] According to the religious ideology of Christoslavism, coined by Michael Sells, "the belief that Slavs are Christian by nature and that any conversion from Christianity is a betrayal of the Slavic race"[8] as seen in Croatian and Serbian nationalism, Slavic Muslim are not regarded part of their ethnic kin, as by conversion to Islam, they become "Turks".[9]

## See also[edit]

* Devshirme (forced recruitment of Balkan Christians)
* Ghulams and mamluks (Islamic military slavery)
* Greek Muslims
* Islam in Europe
* Bosnian mujahideen
* European Council for Fatwa and Research
* European Islam
* Islamic dress in Europe
* Islamic terrorism in Europe
* Islamism and Islamic terrorism in the Balkans
* Islamization of Albania
* Islamization of Bosnia and Herzegovina
* Liberal and progressive Islam in Europe
* Muslim Council for Cooperation in Europe
* Liberal and progressive movements within Islam
* Muslim world
* Religion in the European Union
* Saqaliba (Slavic slaves in the Muslim world)

## Notes[edit]

a.  | ^ Kosovo is the subject of a territorial dispute between the Republic of Kosovo and the Republic of Serbia. The Republic of Kosovo unilaterally declared independence on 17 February 2008. Serbia continues to claim it as part of its own sovereign territory. The two governments began to normalise relations in 2013, as part of the 2013 Brussels Agreement. Kosovo is currently recognised as an independent state by 97 out of the 193 United Nations member states. In total, 112 UN member states have recognised Kosovo at some point, of which 15 later withdrew their recognition.

|

## References[edit]

1. ^ a b Cesari, Jocelyne, ed. (2014). "Part III: The Old European Land of Islam". The Oxford Handbook of European Islam. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 427–616. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199607976.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-19-960797-6. LCCN 2014936672. S2CID 153038977.
2. ^ a b Clayer, Nathalie (2004). "Les musulmans des Balkans Ou l'islam de «l'autre Europe»/The Balkans Muslims Or the Islam of the «Other Europe»". Religions, pouvoir et société: Europe centrale, Balkans, CEI. Le Courrier de Pays de l'Est (in French). Paris: La Documentation française. 5 (1045): 16–27. doi:10.3917/cpe.045.0016. ISSN 0590-0239 - via Cairn.info.
3. ^ a b Bougarel, Xavier; Clayer, Nathalie (2013). Les musulmans de l'Europe du Sud-Est: Des Empires aux États balkaniques. Terres et gens d'islam (in French). Paris: IISMM \- Karthala. pp. 1–20. ISBN 978-2-8111-0905-9 - via Cairn.info.
4. ^ Macnamara, Ronan (January 2013). "Slavic Muslims: The forgotten minority of Macedonia". Security and Human Rights. Leiden: Brill Publishers/Martinus Nijhoff Publishers on behalf of the Netherlands Helsinki Committee. 23 (4): 347–355. doi:10.1163/18750230-99900038. eISSN 1875-0230. ISSN 1874-7337.
5. ^ a b Popović, Alexandre; Rashid, Asma (Summer–Autumn 1997). "The Muslim Culture In The Balkans (16th–18th Centuries)". Islamic Studies. Islamic Research Institute (International Islamic University, Islamabad). 36 (2/3, Special Issue: Islam In The Balkans): 177–190. eISSN 2710-5326. ISSN 0578-8072. JSTOR 23076193.
6. ^ Cesari, Jocelyne (January–June 2002). "Introduction - "L'Islam en Europe: L'Incorporation d'Une Religion"". Cahiers d'Études sur la Méditerranée Orientale et le monde Turco-Iranien (in French). Paris: Éditions de Boccard. 33: 7–20. doi:10.3406/CEMOT.2002.1623. S2CID 165345374. Retrieved 21 January 2021 - via Persée.fr.
7. ^ Sabrina P. Ramet (1989). Religion and Nationalism in Soviet and East European Politics. Duke University Press. pp. 380–. ISBN 978-0-8223-0891-1.
8. ^ Steven L. Jacobs (2009). Confronting Genocide: Judaism, Christianity, Islam. Lexington Books. pp. 82–. ISBN 978-0-7391-3589-1.
9. ^ Omer Bartov; Phyllis Mack (1 January 2001). In God's Name: Genocide and Religion in the Twentieth Century. Berghahn Books. pp. 183–. ISBN 978-1-57181-302-2.

### Bibliography[edit]

* Aščerić-Todd, Ines (2015). Dervishes and Islam in Bosnia: Sufi Dimensions to the Formation of Bosnian Muslim Society. The Ottoman Empire and its Heritage. 58. Leiden: Brill Publishers. doi:10.1163/9789004288447. ISBN 978-90-04-27821-9. ISSN 1380-6076. S2CID 127053309.
* Bougarel, Xavier; Clayer, Nathalie (2013). Les musulmans de l'Europe du Sud-Est: Des Empires aux États balkaniques. Terres et gens d'islam (in French). Paris: IISMM \- Karthala. ISBN 978-2-8111-0905-9 - via Cairn.info.
* Cesari, Jocelyne, ed. (2014). The Oxford Handbook of European Islam. Oxford: Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199607976.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-19-960797-6. LCCN 2014936672. S2CID 153038977.
* Clayer, Nathalie (2004). "Les musulmans des Balkans Ou l'islam de «l'autre Europe»/The Balkans Muslims Or the Islam of the «Other Europe»". Religions, pouvoir et société: Europe centrale, Balkans, CEI. Le Courrier de Pays de l'Est (in French). Paris: La Documentation française. 5 (1045): 16–27. doi:10.3917/cpe.045.0016. ISSN 0590-0239 - via Cairn.info.
* Friedman, Francine (2000). Mylonas, Harris (ed.). "The Muslim Slavs of Bosnia and Herzegovina (with Reference to the Sandžak of Novi Pazar): Islam as National Identity". Nationalities Papers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Association for the Study of Nationalities. 28 (1): 165–180. doi:10.1080/00905990050002498. eISSN 1465-3923. ISSN 0090-5992. S2CID 154938106.
* Ghodsee, Kristen (2010). Muslim Lives in Eastern Europe: Gender, Ethnicity, and the Transformation of Islam in Postsocialist Bulgaria. Princeton Studies in Muslim Politics. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-13955-5. JSTOR j.ctt7sk20. OCLC 677987523.
* Greenberg, Robert D. (2009). "Dialects, Migrations, and Ethnic Rivalries: The Case of Bosnia-Herzegovina". Journal of Slavic Linguistics. Bloomington, Indiana: Slavica Publishers (Indiana University Press). 17 (1/2): 193–216. doi:10.1353/jsl.0.0022. JSTOR 24600141. S2CID 154466698.
* Malečková, Jitka (2020). "Civilizing the Slavic Muslims of Bosnia-Herzegovina". "The Turk" in the Czech Imagination (1870s-1923). Studia Imagologica. 26. Leiden: Brill Publishers. pp. 118–158. doi:10.1163/9789004440791_005. ISBN 978-90-04-44077-7. ISSN 0927-4065.
* Račius, Egdūnas, ed. (2020). Islam in Post-communist Eastern Europe: Between Churchification and Securitization. Muslim Minorities. 35. Leiden: Brill Publishers. ISBN 978-90-04-42534-7. ISSN 1570-7571. LCCN 2020907634.
* Šuško, Dževada, ed. (2019). Both Muslim and European: Diasporic and Migrant Identities of Bosniaks. Muslim Minorities. 30. Leiden: Brill Publishers. ISBN 978-90-04-39402-5. ISSN 1570-7571. LCCN 2018061684.
* Zheliazkova, Antonina (July 1994). "The Penetration and Adaptation of Islam in Bosnia from the Fifteenth to the Nineteenth Century". Journal of Islamic Studies. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 5 (2: Islam in The Balkans): 187–208. doi:10.1093/jis/5.2.187. eISSN 1471-6917. ISSN 0955-2340. JSTOR 26195615. S2CID 144333779.

### Further reading[edit]

* Akyol, Riada Asimovic (13 January 2019). "Bosnia Offers a Model of Liberal European Islam". The Atlantic. Washington, D.C. Archived from the original on 13 January 2019. Retrieved 18 April 2021.
* Allievi, Stefano; Maréchal, Brigitte; Dassetto, Felice; Nielsen, Jørgen S., eds. (2003). Muslims in the Enlarged Europe: Religion and Society. Choice Reviews Online. Muslim Minorities. 2. Leiden: Brill Publishers. doi:10.5860/choice.41-6771. ISBN 978-90-04-13201-6. ISSN 1570-7571. S2CID 142974009.
* Bencheikh, Ghaleb; Brahimi-Semper, Adam (19 May 2019). "L'Islam dans le Sud-Est Européen". www.franceculture.fr (in French). Paris: France Culture. Retrieved 25 March 2021.
* Bougarel, Xavier; Clayer, Nathalie, eds. (2001). Le Nouvel Islam Balkanique. Les Musulmans, acteurs du post-communisme, 1990-2000 (in French). Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose. ISBN 2-7068-1493-4.
* Isani, Mujtaba; Schlipphak, Bernd (August 2017). Schneider, Gerald (ed.). "In the European Union we trust: European Muslim attitudes toward the European Union". European Union Politics. SAGE Publications. 18 (4): 658–677. doi:10.1177/1465116517725831. eISSN 1741-2757. ISSN 1465-1165. LCCN 00234202. OCLC 43598989. S2CID 158771481.
* Popović, Alexandre (1986). L'Islam balkanique: les musulmans du sud-est européen dans la période post-ottomane. Balkanologische Veröffentlichungen (in French). 11. Berlin: Osteuropa-Institut an der Freien Universität Berlin. ISBN 9783447025980. OCLC 15614864.
* Stieger, Cyrill (5 October 2017). "Die Flexibilität der slawischen Muslime". Neue Zürcher Zeitung (in German). Zürich. Archived from the original on 5 October 2017. Retrieved 25 March 2021.

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