Lecture of Aleksandra Djuric Milovanovic, PhD, Migrations of Religious Minorities: A Case Study of the Nazarenes in North America

Dr. Aleksandra Đurić Milovanović, a Principal Research Fellow at the Institute for Balkan Studies of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, held a lecture on September 25, 2024, entitled “Migrations of Religious Minorities: A Case Study of the Nazarenes in North America”. The lecture was held at the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts and was organized by the Board for the Study of National Minorities and Human Rights of SASA. During the lecture, Dr. Djurić Milovanović also presented her new monograph dedicated to the migration of the Nazarenes to North America and discussed the role of religion in migration processes. As the history of migration is highly diverse, both chronologically and geographically, this lecture focused on the migrations of religious minorities within the socio-historical context of post-war Yugoslavia (after 1945). The case study focuses on members of the Christian Nazarene community, whose emigration is analysed through the lenses of their religious identity and pacifism. The Nazarenes, known as the Apostolic Christian Church in North America, represent unstudied neo-Protestant community in the diaspora, whose migration history provides new insights into policies toward minority religions during socialism, migration patterns of religious minorities, and mechanisms of integration into American society. Migration routes, life in refugee camps, and adaptation to a new society are present in the narratives of the Nazarenes in America, which were part of extensive research conducted in the state of Ohio.