This book tells the story of the Muslim community in modern Bulgaria during a period of imperial dissolution, conflicting national and imperial enterprises, and the emergence of new national and ethnic identities. Following the Ottoman-Russian war of 1877-1878 that paved the way for Bulgarian independence, a movement for cultural reform and political mobilization gained momentum within Bulgaria’s sizable Muslim population. From the establishment of the Bulgarian state in 1878 until the 1908 Young Turk revolution, this reform movement emerged as part of a struggle to redefine Muslim collective ... More

This book tells the story of the Muslim community in modern Bulgaria during a period of imperial dissolution, conflicting national and imperial enterprises, and the emergence of new national and ethnic identities. Following the Ottoman-Russian war of 1877-1878 that paved the way for Bulgarian independence, a movement for cultural reform and political mobilization gained momentum within Bulgaria’s sizable Muslim population. From the establishment of the Bulgarian state in 1878 until the 1908 Young Turk revolution, this reform movement emerged as part of a struggle to redefine Muslim collective identity without severing ties to the Ottomans, during a period when Muslims were losing faith in the Sultan, while also fearing Young Turk secularism. This book draws on both Ottoman and Eastern European historiographies, and approaches the question of Balkan Muslims’ engagement with modernity through a transnational lens, demonstrating how Bulgarian Muslims debated similar questions as Muslims elsewhere around the world. This book situates the Bulgarian story within a global narrative of Muslim political and cultural reform movements, analyzes how Muslims understood and conceptualized “Europe,” and reveals the centrality of the Bulgarian Muslims to the Young Turk Revolution. Milena Methodieva makes a compelling case for how the experience of a Muslim minority provides new insight into the nature of nationalism, citizenship, and state formation.