Professor Winland’s current research focuses on the challenges faced by Bosnian Croats in the decade since the end of the Yugoslav Wars of Succession: the imposition of the UN Dayton Peace Accords in 1995 and, since September 11, 2001, the ‘War on Terror’.

Her ongoing interest in the degree to which right wing nationalist agendas become entrenched in post-communist nation-building projects is reflected in current developments in Bosnia and Hercegovina where Croats, specifically political and religious elites, proclaim their central role in the ‘War on Terror’ at the “front-lines in the war against Islamic terrorism in the Balkans”. This research reflects broadly focused interests in nationalism and the cultural politics of representation / recognition, diaspora and transnationalism, memory and discourse analysis.

Her interests also include ethnographic research methodology, space and place, ethnicity, multiculturalism and cultural theory. Her earlier work on Mennonite ethnicity, and religious conversion and gender among Laotian Hmong refugees has also been published. “We are now a Nation”: Croats Between ‘Home’ and ‘Homeland (University of Toronto Press, 2007) focuses on the impact of Croatian war and independence on the diaspora in Canada and on diaspora-homeland relations.

Her most recent research examines challenges faced by Croatians in writing their future now that they are independent. How do new pressures to conform to European Union criteria for inclusion into an expanded Europe, contribute to their efforts to shed the stigma of Croatians as a Balkan peoples, mired in ethnonationalist conflict. What role do diaspora Croats play in helping or hindering Croats efforts at fostering a liberal-democratic image worthy of the West.