The European University Institute in Florence, in April 1999 held an academic conference on Before The Rain - One Film, Many Histories http://www.iue.it/Personal/Strath/Conferences/rain.htm.

The papers were published in the journal Rethinking History www.tandf.co.uk/journals/routledge, Volume 4 No. 2 (Content of Vol. 4 No.2):
......Victor A. Friedman Fable as History: the Macedonian Context 1
......Dina Iordanova Before the Rain in a Balkan Context
......Robert Burgoyne: Ethnic Nationalism and Globalization
......Ian Christie Landscape and Location: Reading Filmic Space Historically
......Erik Tangerstad Before the Rain - After the War?
......Robert A. Rosenstone A History of What Has Not Yet Happened
......Milcho Manchevski Rainmaking and Personal Truth
......and the synopsis of Before The Rain One Film - Many Histories: an Inquiry Into Before the Rain.
.