Recreating the Future: Modern Residential Neighbourhood and Existing Toponyms in Sarajevo

Abstract

Sarajevo’s two largest municipalities, Novo Sarajevo (New Sarajevo) and Novi Grad (New City), were built in the second half of the twentieth century, as a result of ambitious and numerous modern urban planning projects. Because these pragmatic and rational processes treated the existing rural landscape as a tabula rasa, the original toponyms were only formally retained. In the perceptions of present-day residents, the urban areas in these two municipalities are an integral and embedded part of their identities and memories. This chapter starts from the supposition that, after several decades, these formerly new residential areas have given new meanings to pre-existing toponyms. It illustrates both the spatial and cultural characteristics of these meanings, and recent instances of their “re-decomposition”, as a consequence of globalization. The research is based on the comparison and analysis of six modern housing estates. An analysis of the typological toponyms of Sarajevo’s historic districts gives greater insight into these urban and social transformations.