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The Making of Egyptians in Kosovo and Macedonia

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Book cover The Politics of Ethnic Consciousness

Abstract

I argue that identity, considered ethnographically, must always be mixed, relational, and inventive. … Identity is conjunctural, not essential. (Clifford 1988: 10–11)1

In the spring of 1991, when Yugoslavia was on the brink of war, I came across some surprising articles in the Yugoslav press on a new ethnic group. In Kosovo and Macedonia, thousands of ‘Egyptians’ were reported to exist, who declared to have settled here centuries ago. It was the first time I heard of them. I knew of Albanians, Serbs and Macedonians, and a number of other ethnic groups existing here, like Turks, Slavic Muslims, Vlahs and even Circassians. However, these (Muslim) Egyptians were almost completely new for me. Almost, because in August 1990 I met a few ‘pro to’-Egyptians at the Serbian monastery of Gračanica, without really giving their contentions serious attention. It was on a warm day in August, Assumption Day, when the famous medieval sanctuary is visited by numerous pilgrims.2 As every year, there were countless Muslim Gypsies visiting the shrine, but some of them, with whom I was able to talk, denied they were Cigani ‘Our origins are unknown, although there are indications that we are either Greeks or Egyptians,’ they explained to me.

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Authors
  1. Ger Duijzings
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Netherlands Foundation for the Advancement of Tropical Research (WOTRO), University of Leiden, Netherlands

    Cora Govers (Research Coordinator) (Research Coordinator)

  2. Institute for Migration and Ethnic Studies, University of Amsterdam, Netherlands

    Hans Vermeulen (Co-director of Research) (Co-director of Research)

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© 1997 Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited

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Duijzings, G. (1997). The Making of Egyptians in Kosovo and Macedonia. In: Govers, C., Vermeulen, H. (eds) The Politics of Ethnic Consciousness. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-64673-9_6

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