World History by the Numbers
The History Fangirl Podcast
In this episode, I chat with Daniel Hoyer from Seshat about looking at history through a statistical lens. We discuss the and his new book, Figuring Out the Past: The 3,495 Vital Statistics that Explain World History. Let's Stay in Touch! You can join the conversation in our Facebook Group, , or come say hi on ! My Travel Websites - Culture & History Travel Guides in the USA, Europe, and Beyond - Balkan Travel Blog - Travel in Oklahoma & Route 66 The theme music for the podcast is "Places Unseen" by Lee Rosevere.
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Veliko Tarnovo: Bulgaria's Medieval Capital
The History Fangirl Podcast
In this episode, I chat with Eric Halsey from the Bulgarian History Podcast about the hidden gem of Veliko Tarnovo. This once-important Bulgarian city is one of the most picturesque in Europe, and yet not many outside of Bulgaria know much about it. You can find Eric's podcast Let's Stay in Touch! You can join the conversation in our Facebook Group, , or come say hi on ! More on Veliko Tarnovo: If you are planning to visit Veliko Tarnovo, here are our Veliko Tarnovo travel guides. My Travel Websites - Culture & History Travel Guides in the USA, Europe,...
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Stalking Chernobyl
The History Fangirl Podcast
Yes, it's been two years, and for that I'm very sorry! But I'm back with new episodes next week. In the meantime, enjoy this interview on Chernobyl I did a few weeks ago with Darmon Richter, the author of the new book Chernobyl, a Stalker's Guide. The theme music for the podcast is "Places Unseen" by Lee Rosevere.
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The Great Kazakh Famine
The History Fangirl Podcast
On today’s episode of the History Fangirl Podcast, we talk with renowned travel blogger Megan Starr, whom we spoke to a few months back about Kiev. But this week, we’re talking in person, in Kazakhstan, at the site of the memorial to the Great Kazakh Famine, a historical event which not many people know about in the West but looms large in the history of Kazakhstan. And, we both have recovered from the Kazakhstani flu that has been going around, so we’re ready to get rolling!
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The World Nomad Games
The History Fangirl Podcast
This week’s episode is something a little different. I am in Isyk-Kul, Kyrgyzstan, covering the World Nomad Games, a festival of sports that’s sort of like the Olympics for nomadic peoples. The sports, though, are way more interesting than, say, basketball. My first interview this episode is with the co-captain of the American Kok Boru team (I’ll explain later), and the sports include horse archery, tug of war, arm wrestling and more.
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The Massacre at Srebrenica
The History Fangirl Podcast
Last year, Alex Cruikshanks came on the show to talk about Belgrade, a really detailed and wide-ranging episode. And we had such a great time, he’s back again to talk about more recent history in Yugoslavia, specifically the brutal massacre at Srebrenica. Yugoslavia, as anyone who was alive in the 1990s knows, was falling apart in the early part of the decade. The Bosnian War was raging, and in 1995, some 8,000 Bosniaks, mostly men and boys, were killed.
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The Strangely Competitive History of the CN Tower
The History Fangirl Podcast
Every city has that one landmark that seems like a tourist trap and practically begs you not to visit. For me, that was the CN Tower in Toronto. I didn’t go near it the first time I visited the city, and the second time, this past July, I planned to steer clear. But it turns out the joke was on me, as the CN Tower is an amazing building with a funny, competitive and ingenious bit of Canadian history.
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Traveling the Green Book
The History Fangirl Podcast
In the first half of the 20th century, the automobile became a symbol of freedom to American families. Middle-class families able to afford their own car were no longer restricted to train or bus timetables, and the great American road trip was born. But for black Americans, this new freedom collided with old hatred, prejudices and dangers. African Americans began using “the Green Book,” a guide to places that were friendly to them along their journey.
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The Best of The History Fangirl Podcast's First Year
The History Fangirl Podcast
We did it! Next week will mark a full year of publishing The History Fangirl Podcast, and this week marks the 50th episode, so it felt like the right time to do a retrospective of the first 12 months of the show. My producer picked a handful of his favorite clips (it was too hard for me to pick!) from the past year, and so this episode looks back on some of the fun and fascinating stories my amazing guests have told.
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Philadelphia's Elfreth's Alley
The History Fangirl Podcast
Philadelphia is by far one of my favorite American cities. I used to live there and run a photo-a-day website there, and it’s one of the best cities to live in if you’re a history buff. On today’s episode, we talk about the amazing Elfreth’s Alley, the oldest continually lived-on residential street in the country (hard to fit that on a title belt, but still pretty cool). I had the chance to take a tour of the street with the Elfreth’s Alley Association’s Board Member Brittany Thomas.
info_outlineLast year, Alex Cruikshanks came on the show to talk about Belgrade, a really detailed and wide-ranging episode. And we had such a great time, he’s back again to talk about more recent history in Yugoslavia, specifically the brutal massacre at Srebrenica. Yugoslavia, as anyone who was alive in the 1990s knows, was falling apart in the early part of the decade. The Bosnian War was raging, and in 1995, some 8,000 Bosniaks, mostly men and boys, were killed. What led up to this genocide, how could something like this happen in our recent history, and what has been the fallout since? Alex is the perfect person to about this, not just because of his podcast, but he just made a trip to participate in a peace march in the region.
How the massacre began
As Alex told me this episode, in the late 1980s, a sort of coalition-by-default formed as Yugoslavia held elections, as the parties that represented the various ethnic factions of the country won a majority. But they soon realized that all that was holding them together was an anti-Communist stance, so the coalition immediately began dissolving. In a referendum in 1992, Bosnians voted for independence, and in the Spring and Summer of 1992, Serbian nationalists begin staging coups throughout the country, placing Serbs in power, and begin massacring non-Serb populations.
Srebrenica stronghold
But while all of this was going on, there were pockets where Bosniaks were able to hold off the Serbian nationalists from taking over. One such stronghold was the small town of Srebrenica, which was able to maintain its autonomy for three years. As Alex says, it only had about 6,000 people before the war, but because so many have been killed or expelled throughout the region, it swells to an unsustainable population of 40,000. In 1993 a militia forms in Srebrenica to try to fight back, and the Serbian army takes notice, planning an invasion. But just as that was heating up, UN peacekeepers visited the town, and ended up putting a small force there, keeping the violence at bay for two years.
How the UN peacekeepers couldn’t keep the peace
But in 1995, Slobodan Milosevic decides it’s time to try to shut down the enclaves, and he issues what becomes known as Directive 7, which orders the separation of Srebrenica from the other enclaves and “by planned and well-thought-out combat operations, create an unbearable situation of total insecurity with no hope of further survival or life for the inhabitants of Srebrenica.” That’s about as grim and awful as it gets, but as Alex says, it’s likely Milosevic was not thinking of massacre, but rather starving the residents until they give up. The Serb national army then takes UN peacekeepers as hostages to ward off UN airstrikes, and in July they begin their combat operations in earnest. Unfortunately, the Bosnian militia were not well-trained fighters, and they ended up falling back.
How the massacre happened, and what happened after
As the Serbian army advanced, many hoped the UN would step in and be able to save the Bosniaks. But many men and boys had a feeling that if they stayed, they would be killed. So they fled, but unfortunately, the Serbs were able to ambush them. It’s a truly horrific story of ethnic cleansing that happened not that long ago. But as Alex and I discuss in this week’s episode, the Bosnian people are actually some of the most liberal and optimistic people we’ve met. It’s an incredible story, and it’s important that we never forget it.
Outline of This Episode
- [1:30] The beginnings of war
- [7:17] Bosniaks able to hold off Serbs
- [12:45] The difference between Croats and Serbs
- [21:09] How the massacre happened
- [35:00] Conditions during the war
- [40:45] How the conflict resolves
- [43:33] The war crimes tribunal
- [51:40] Alex’s trip to Bosnia
Resources Mentioned
Connect With Stephanie
Featuring the song “Places Unseen” by Lee Rosevere.
More info and photographs for this episode at:
https://historyfangirl.com/the-massacre-at-srebrenica/