A Culture Carried: Bosnians in Bowling Green/Kulturno naslijeđe: Bosanci u Bowling Green-u (review)

The exhibition A Cultured Carried: Bosnians in Bowling Greenat the Kentucky Museum at Western Kentucky University (WKU) demonstrates the power of folkloristic museum initiatives. It is ethnographically researched and cocurated with a community that has a great investment in their new home and, moreover, now also with the Kentucky Museum and the WKU campus. Based on an ongoing oral history project of the Kentucky Folklife Program and the Department of Folk Studies and Anthropology, the exhibition tells the story of the Bosnians in Bowling Green, including how the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina in the mid-1990s forced thousands of people to quickly leave their homes, taking only a few family possessions and special objects. These refugees, nevertheless, also brought their culture and traditions. The exhibition displays some of the belongings that families "carried" with them and explores how they made this Kentucky city their home. Using artifacts, images, text, and digital media, the curators encourage visitors to listen to the stories of these immigrants and to "get to know them."

Through large colorful maps, the exhibition introduces the Balkan region to visitors and shows how the ethnic makeup of Bosnia and Herzegovina changed due to the war in the 1990s and the horrific Bosnian genocide in Srebrenica that claimed the lives of more than 8,000 men and boys. After overviewing the Balkan conflict and the genocide, the exhibition focuses on the refugees' flight from the region and their process of making Bowling Green their home. From foodways and clothing to festival and craft, the exhibition paints an approachable picture of Bosnian life in this Kentucky city—one where Bosnian American students and visitors can see their own culture and family experience and share it with other visitors. Two of the displays are especially effective in this way. First is a life-size replica of a family room, with woven rugs and ethnic keepsakes on display, with a flat-screen television on one wall and a window on the back wall looking out on a Kentucky yardscape. Like the exhibition as a whole, this display invites visitors to look in on the contemporary life of an immigrant family. The other section of the exhibition, which is especially insightful, focuses on Bosnian food traditions and the importance of hospitality. A quote from an interview in large lettering on the wall explains: "Hospitality is like, it's something we're born with … that's the Bosnian Way." In addition to showing images of several traditional foods such as cevapi(small beef sausages wrapped in bread) and sweet baklava, the interpretive panel describes the five steps in making Bosnian coffee, which is an important tradition for the Bosnians of Bowling Green. The exhibit explains that the making and drinking of coffee is an example of ćejf, a practice that promotes mindfulness and pleasure in one's life. Coffee is more than a beverage in this context: it is a ritual embedded in daily life for this community.

Due to the social and political forces that caused their immigration, the majority of Bowling Green's Bosnians are Muslim (Bosniaks), but immigrants also include Bosnian Serbs (primarily Orthodox Christians) and Bosnian Croats (primarily Catholics). Museumgoers are encouraged to touch three strands of beads, each associated with these religious groups. Next to the two strands of beads used in Christian prayer is a tespih, the prayer beads used by Bosnian Muslims. This hands-on display, with a sign that says "Please Touch," encourages visitors to grasp the religious diversity of this immigrant community as well as that of their homeland.

The public programs planned around this exhibition demonstrate the way that folklorists in museums amplify an exhibit's text, images, and artifacts by placing them in dialogue with a community. When I attended the opening, I was thrilled to see the exhibition, sample Bosnian food, try Bosnian coffee, listen...