A MIRROR FOR THE “SUBORDINATED“ AND THE “HUMILIATED“ AT THE BALKANS

The text refers to the Islamized Macedonian population in Western and North-western Macedonia, and the politicisation of their ethnic identity. This is a population that speaks Macedonian and has authentic culture, that lives in few ethnic areas in the Macedonian-Albanian and Kosovo border region, as well as in some border areas in Albania and Kosovo. They are known under different ethnic names, as “Torbeshi“, “Nashinci“, “Kurki“; “Uljufi“ etc. Two terms are used parallely in this text: “Torbeshi“ and “Nashinci“, those are names which this group has assigned to itself, or they were assigned to them by others. The first term is widely accepted, while the second is accepted by the population itself and does not imply religious background.