How was Yugoslavia presented in the West?

I wasn’t very political as a young person, and I knew very little about history and governments.

I grew up thinking of Yugoslavia as a place some of my friends families came from. One particular family the girls were strikingly beautiful. My Yugoslavian friend in elementary school took me ice skating my first time.

For me, it was just another country where friends (or their families) came from. I had friends from Japan, Italy, Russia, Colombia, Pakistan, Hungary, everywhere. I didn’t think anything about it.

I don’t remember learning much about Yugoslavia as a kid.

I was born in 1968.

Of course there was no single “the West”. Opinions varied. But I can give you a little American perspective The average American thought Yugoslavia was East Bloc, like Poland and East Germany.

Well-read Americans knew Yugoslavia was different. Not a Warsaw Pact country, but not an ally.

Also from a personal perspective, it was sad in the 1990s when the immigrants I knew separated into groups. I live in Chicago, and we have a large Yugo population.

Before the war they were friends here as “Yugos” and then the war came and they separated as Serbs, Croats, Bosnians, etc.

Ditto @JLeslie about the girls being stunningly beautiful. I knew a Yugoslav girl, Tanya, in Jr. High, lived right next door. No inhibitions at all. Used to come over to my yard in a bikini, and ask me what I was doing. I’d be like, I’m homeing my – no, I’m doing my bikini, no I- I don’t know what I’m doing. LOL