Genocidal Rape, Enforced Impregnation, and the Discourse of Serbian National Identity

Abstract

In her article Genocidal Rape, Enforced Impregnation, and the Discourse of Serbian National Identity Tatjana Takseva analyzes two main processes which contributed to the systematic rape and enforced impregnation of Bosniak women during the Balkan conflict: the discourse of Serbian nationalism articulated in response to the sexual violence that took place in Kosovo preceding the war and the simultaneous diminishing and downgrading of women's political and social autonomy on all territories of the former Yugoslavia. Based on statements in narratives of Bosniak women rape survivors, Takseva argues that these ideologically motivated processes combined to revive, inflame, and militarize long-standing Serbian stereotypes about Muslims and the supposed threat they represent. Tatjana Takseva, Genocidal Rape, Enforced Impregnation, and the Discourse of Serbian National Identity page 2 of 8 CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 17.3 (2015): Thematic Issue Life Writing and the Trauma of War. Ed. Louise O. Vasvari and I-Chun Wang