Gender Roles In Yugoslavian Society

These acts of sexually driven terror violated both females and males from victim ethnic groups and exposed the gendered roles and behaviours produced from the structures of Yugoslavian society. These include the honour/shame complex highlighting patriarchal gender relations and the objectification of women's bodies as ‘boundaries of the nation' due to their reproductive, nurturing and preserving powers. Nevertheless, the manner in which these notions of patriotic masculinity were exhibited defined wartime male gender roles as ‘tough, dominant and heterosexual' (Skjelsbaek 2001) yet simultaneously reinforced the ‘pre-existing social dynamics and cultural meanings' (Olujic 1998) of peacetime female gender roles.

The first gendered role exhibited in times of peace is illustrated in the zadruga (Olujic 1998), the extended family in Slavic culture that works as a nucleus for the patriarchal regime and provides the behavioural norms characteristic to each gender role, encapsulated in the notion of the male protection of female honour. These pre-existing sociocultural dynamics drew upon meanings of sexuality – the control of women by men and protection of their sexuality, which were common and convenient means of justifying the domination of women by men in South-eastern Europe.

As the core of Yugoslavian cultural ideologies, women were valued only as sex objects, mothers, and workers yet also represented the code of honour and shame of the family. Due to Yugoslavia's strict patriarchal system, the gender identities of males labelled them as unquestionably dominant figures, embodied in customs of epic singing called ganga which communicated the ideals on womanhood, but most importantly reinforced male virility and masculinity and de...

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...expose the constructed nature of gendered roles and behaviours.

Pre-existing gender relations become accentuated as the use of sexual violence reaffirms the patriarchal hierarchies between men and women. The strategic purpose of rape exhibits the militaristic masculinity of the perpetrator and subsequently feminizes the victim by physically controlling their body. Additionally, women's roles as central to constructing national borders and preserving or denying identities exposes the fact that the more patriarchal a system is, the more so is its vulnerability to an enemy attack exploiting such gendered roles.

However, in times of war, these ideals are reinforced as women's bodies become the symbolic terrain of male competition whilst qualities of power and violence associated with hegemonic masculinity construct and define male gendered roles and behaviours.