Twin Cultures and Rubik’s Cube Politics: The Dynamics of Cultural Production in Pro-YU, Post-YU, and Other YU Inventions
Twin Cultures and Rubik’s Cube Politics: The Dynamics of Cultural Production in Pro-YU, Post-YU, and Other YU Inventions

Summary/Abstract: Abstract. This article presents a critical approach to academic research on Yugoslav nostalgia as well as on popular culture related to such nostalgia. Its framework is the larger context of the history of Yugoslavia and the use of the term “Yugoslavia” in the cultures of the countries that were created from the previous Yugoslav federal units. The author points to inadequate compositions of new terms containing the word “nostalgia”, to the lack of interdisciplinary approaches, and to epistemological flaws. These inadequacies might result from various sources – from a scholar’s only ephemeral interest in the topic, from cultural colonialism, or from a certain “colonial wisdom” (understood as a readiness to offer adaptable and/or acceptable interpretations and to ignore local knowledge). The author detects little theoretical thinking in terms of models of interpretation in this thematic field and therefore proposes three new models of reflection and research – twin cultures, cultural intimacy, and ground truthing. The Rubik’s cube serves as a visual metaphor of the ways ethnic politics have been planned and executed by international authorities and the ways in which they have been practiced by Yugoslav cultures. A different conceptualization of the problem is exemplified by two contemporary theatre productions in the region.

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