Congratulations to faculty member Bojana Videkanic on the growing success of a new organization of Yugoslav scholars, artists and community members which she helped to establish. Since its original conception in 2021 the New Yugoslav Studies Association has grown to include almost 700 members. The Association has recently been the subject of several interviews, including one by the Association of Slavic, East European, and Eurasian scholars (ASEEES) that can be found on their website.
The New Yugoslav Studies Association is an ASEEES-affiliated interdisciplinary organization dedicated to the study of the Yugoslav political project, culture, and society from a transnational perspective. The association exists to facilitate critical scholarly inquiry, promote exchange of knowledge about Yugoslavia, and maintain its legacies and ongoing relevance. It seeks to bring together researchers, educators, and students of Yugoslavia from across diverse academic, national, and linguistic backgrounds.
The “new” in our name refers not only to a renewed scholarly interest in a country that no longer exists, but also—and more importantly—to a shared methodological stance: namely, a refusal to accept ethno-nationalism and the destruction of socialist Yugoslavia as the only lens through which its significance ought to be viewed. Finally, it also signals an orientation toward the future of research in which Yugoslav critical, historical, social, cultural, and artistic interventions matter—in the region and beyond.