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The distinction between kinds of guilt has not lost its power to illuminate matters, and it remains a great tool to study the consequences of forgetting guilt of any kind. Karl Jaspers made the distinction between kinds of guilt mainly to ease the Germans coping with guilt, as all of them were blamed for the evil that happened under Adolf Hitler. Jaspers believed that in using this distinction the German nation could have come back to its origins, and thus purified, take its part in the possible future unity of the world and of all mankind. But soon after World War II ended, a confluence of political, social, psychological and philosophical factors contributed to a situation in which a large number of culprits were not brought to account: criminals were rarely rightly punished. In addition, many Germans believing in the ideology of National Socialism felt no guilt in terms of morality; they downplayed the political guilt; they negated the very existence of the metaphysical guilt. The process of forgetting guilt occurred.
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Alice Zeniter’s 2017 novel The Art of Losing, translated recently by Frank Wynne from French to English, explores how buried histories resurface and haunt generations to come, despite national efforts to ignore, if not minimalize, the enduring impacts of colonialism, independence struggles and exile. Set in contemporary France in the wake of the 2015 terrorist attacks, and loosely inspired by Zeniter’s own family history, the book follows Naïma, a young woman of Algerian decent who grapples with a largely unknown and misconstrued harki heritage. Drawing on Marianne Hirsch’s concept of postmemory, this article investigates intergenerational transmission of memory, trauma, and silence around themes such as war, exile and integration.
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Serban Oliver Tataru and Alfred Guzzetti are filmmakers that investigate on camera the role of memory in the construction of family history. They interview family members, gather old home movies and family photographs, and dig for public archival footage, in an effort to assume their position within a personal historical continuum, and to affirm their agency within their familial community. In their creative affirmation of generational subjectivity, they push against accepted familial narratives, and use the camera as a surgical tool that troubles lingering wounds beyond the surface of old images. In Anatomy of a Departure (2012), Romanian-German filmmaker Serban Oliver Tataru interviews his parents about their decision to emigrate from Ceausescu’s Romania while he was a teenager, scrutinizing on camera the conditions and consequence of a life-changing decision. While the dynamic of filming one’s own family is reminiscent of home movie tropes, and the tension built around sharing delicate memories reveals an intimacy usually intended to remain private, the film proposes a multilayered performance of the authorial self. As the film reveals a self-portrait set against the familial portrait (Marianne Hirsch), an inherent performative element acts as the necessary mediator between private and public, between ethic, aesthetic and politic. Negotiating between a restorative and a reflective nostalgia (Svetlana Boym), Tataru proposes a live performance of homecoming.
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Relations between the Republic of Bulgaria and the Republic of (North) 76 Macedonia often face challenges. Regardless of the fact that in the history of the young country, Skopje receives the most intense support precisely from Sofia, some political circles rely on the anti-Bulgarian rhetoric. The persistence of these messages often creates anti-Bulgarian sentiments, which is a serious obstacle in the development of relations between the two countries. Therefore, Bulgaria requested that these issues be settled with a special bilateral agreement, in which the two countries, in addition to the traditional declarations of friendship and good neighborliness, also undertake to avoid the language of hatred. The Treaty signed in 2017 has been ratified by both countries and is in force for them. However, its norms do not find the expected application and this is evident from the reaction of the Macedonian state to the Bulgarian clubs registered in the cities of Ohrid and Bitola.
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Review of: Ingerimaa mälupaigad: järjepidevus ja katkestus. Ingrian Memory Sites: Continuity and Discontinuity. (Eesti Akadeemilise Ingerimaa Seltsi ja Eesti Rahvusraamatukogu toimetised 1.) Koostanud Piret Lotman, Taisto-Kalevi Raudalainen, Ergo-Hart Västrik. Eesti Akadeemiline Ingerimaa Selts, Eesti Rahvusraamatu-kogu, 2022. 216 lk.
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In to the year 2019, 100 years of Romanian administration in the Băile Herculane resort were completed. Through the execution of the great act of December 1, 1918 establishing Greater Romania, the age-old dream of our people to live in a single country called Romania was fulfilled. We should remember the great deeds of our forefathers and honor their memory.
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This study focuses on the preoccupations of the Romanian authorities after 1990 to recover the memory of the military men (dead and prisoners) who had fallen in the 1941-1944 campaign alongside Germany. The author, through the positions he held and the long-time study in former-Soviet archives, brought a great contribution to the identification of Romanian military prisoners, in Soviet concentration camps, to the establishment of Romanian commemorative monuments of war on Russian territory, as well as to the editing of valuable volumes of documents, of which one work stands out: Romanian prisoners of war in the Soviet Union. Documents 1941-1956, Monitorul Oficial Publishing House, Bucharest, 2013. Thus, in 1998, through the kindness and with the financial support of the German side, the instalment of the first Romanian commemorative monument of war took place in Rada, Tambov region, in the international cemetery where 11,969 foreign soldiers, all dead as prisoners of war, had been buried. 1,996 of them were Romanians. Another relevant accomplishment was the compilation of the nominal list of 20,718 Romanian prisoners of war (military) and hospitalised (deported civilians), who had passed away between 1941-1956 in the concentration camps, hospitals and special units of the NKVDMVD, respectively the Soviet labour battalions that existed on the present Russian territory. Through significant research and organisational efforts, on October 15, 2025, with the occasion of the Day of the Romanian Army, the Romanian military cemetery from Rossoska was inaugurated, close to Stalingrad. The second Romanian military cemetery in Russia, inaugurated on November 26, 2018, is found in Apsheronsk, District of Krasnodar (1,500 km south of Moscow).
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Given that anthropological work is a collaborative endeavour, this paper focuses on analysing collective memory practices through material gathered during interviews with the interlocutors from the fieldwork on displacement of Serbs from Kosovo and Metohija conducted in Niš, Belgrade, and in the region of Kosovo and Metohija in the period from 2020. to 2022. Through contextual analyses of literature and documentary films about the life of Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija, this case study examines social, political and cultural circumstances which affect the production of chosen works. The amateur documentary films Life Defined by a Loaf (2013), Pristina: Imperfect (Unfinished) Story (2016), Yellow Buss (2018), Vidovdan: One Day of Life (2019) and books Pristina, Pristinians and Time (1999), Kosovo and Metohija: to have and to have not (2004) of one of the main interlocutors, Radmila Todić Vulićević, who is herself a displaced person, are taken as primary material for the case study and compared with narratives collected during fieldwork. Since the paper is covering the fields of visual anthropology and anthropology of literature, the methodology is based on anthropological premises that memory is intersubjecitve. Treatment of memory as a social process therefore allows analysis of imagolocical aspects of the chosen works. The main aim is to contribute to the understanding of how remembering and forgetting intertwine in periods of social and cultural upheavals, and of the effects of post-war conditions on the life of Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija, as well as displaced persons.
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The primary purpose of this article was to initiate an analysis of the founding myths of the Polish state – their existence and reproduction in the community – in the context of both memetics theory and virtual sites of memory. The research fi eld, broadly outlined by theoretical considerations, was signifi cantly limited in the presented text. Thus, only selected accounts on the Facebook social network were analyzed (within the specifi ed time range) – on the one hand, those representing public institutions dealing with commemoration, and on the other, those private ones, for which one of the purposes is to conduct narratives of memory.
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The Armenian Genocide, which took place from 1915 to 1917, is one of the most crucial events defi ning the character of both the fi nal period of the Ottoman Empire and the southern front of World War I. It is also a core identity reference for Armenians and a matter of memory dispute with the Turkish Republic. Since the 1970s, it has been a relevant research space for historians. Surprisingly, in Polish historiography, the subject is only marginally addressed, and its bibliography is puzzlingly limited. The article aims to discuss the Polish historiography of the Armenian Genocide in the broader context of world research. The description of the number of Polish inputs devoted to the Armenian Genocide provides background for the main research problem – a refl ection on the shape of genocide narratives created by Polish historians. This makes it possible to indicate the discursive structures that determine the historical narratives on the Armenian Genocide. Hypothetically, they result from both the time in which they were created and the authors’ axiology and worldview. The article is divided into two parts. The fi rst, in addition to the introduction and description of the state of research, focuses on the interpretation of all Polish historical texts concerning the issue of the Armenian Genocide. A critical analysis is devoted to both compact monographs and broader historical works in which reference is made to the issue of the genocide, above all in the context of the historiography of the declining period of the Ottoman Empire.
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The war between the Hanseatic cities and Denmark between 1367 and 1370 and the Treaty of Stralsund concluding it have entered the public consciousness as the peak of the history of the Hanseatic League, although in reality, it looked different in many ways. The Hanseatic cities of Lower Saxony and Westphalia did not take part in the conflict, while there were some among the warring cities who were not members of the Hanseatic League, and even princes and kings joined the military alliance against Denmark. The study is about the causes of the armed conflict, the invasion of Gotland by Valdemar IV, King of Denmark, (22-27 July 1361), the response of most of the Hanseatic cities, the formation of the alliance of Greifswald (1 August 1361), joined by Magnus, King of Sweden and Haakon, King of Norway. The first war against Denmark brought the defeat of the alliance of Greifswald (1362-1364), but the new anti-Valdemar coalition established with the Confederation of Cologne (1367) won a significant victory in the subsequent war, which Denmark recognised in the Treaty of Stralsund (24 May 1370).
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Cultural differences in different geographies and societies are not limited to language, traditions or lifestyles. Culture can also have an impact on design, art and communication styles. This study examines the effects of cultural differences and collective memory on poster design in general and movie posters in particular. Movie posters play a critical role in the promotion of movies. They provide viewers with first impressions about the movie and represent a visual story to attract the audience to the movie. However, people from different cultures and with different collective memories may react differently to colors, symbols, slogans and visual arguments. For example, in one society, a color, a symbol, a discourse or a slogan may have positive meanings, while in another society with different cultural values and collective memory, these arguments may have negative and negative meanings. In this context, cultural changes and collective memory are important factors that determine the design of visual communication tools such as movie posters. Designers can design more effective posters by taking cultural factors and collective memories into consideration. This can both help films reach a wider audience and help audiences have deeper and more meaningful experiences. Therefore, it is important to pay attention to cultural diversity and collective memory in the field of poster design. Posters, which are also seen as pre-publication visual communication forms of motion pictures, have gained a very popular momentum today. Cinema companies have started to produce universal films and to make posters for these films according to different geographies, different cultures and collective memories. At this point, it was observed that different posters were produced for a single movie. In this study, the effects of culture and collective memory on movie posters will be examined and a detailed perspective will be gained on the subject by using the comparative analysis method through poster designs.
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This research examines visitor engagement with genocidal memorial museums expressed in visitor comments at the conclusion of the museum visit. We analyze the educative function of memorial museums in genocide prevention. Museums that advance a preventative function are gaining traction in the literature on transitional justice, especially that on non-punitive, restorative justice mechanisms. In this sense, we examine two museums in Guatemala and measure visitor engagement and the efficacy of never again. In Guatemala City, we examine the Casa de la Memoria, which presents the complete historical narrative of the Maya. In Baja Verapaz, we study the Rabinal Museo Comunitario de la Memoria Historica, exclusive to the historical memory of the Maya Achí and which seeks to educate about the genocide committed against them by the government between 1980 and 1984. We develop a typology of the comments we call memory-words left by visitors to each museum as recorded in their guest logs/visitor books and in other memorial spaces within each museum that allows for individual expression of the museum experience. Finally, we try to determine whether each museums’ typology of memory-words resulted in a particular message (specific to Guatemala) or a more universal message of never again that mirrors current mass atrocities world-wide, and if so, in what context.
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Nearly three decades have passed since the conclusion of the last war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Despite the absence of direct experiences or memories of atrocity crimes and mass victimization, post-war generations bear the long-term consequences of war through the influence of their parents. Collective traumas, both from the distant and recent past, have become integral to group identities and memories, shaping everyday life, narratives, emotions, and mental representations among these generations. These transgenerational collective traumas can potentially lead to the radicalization of young individuals. Surprisingly, the role of group radicalization resulting from collective traumas has been largely overlooked in previous literature. This paper aims to bridge this research gap by elucidating the concepts of intergenerational (collective) trauma, its transmission, and the potential for youth radicalization. Through the synthesis and explanation of these concepts, a framework for a contextualized understanding of how collective traumas impact the radicalization of youth is proposed. To analyze the issue, interviews and focus groups were conducted in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The paper concludes with policy recommendations.
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Review of: Bartlová, Milena a kol.: Co bylo Československo? Kulturní konstrukce státní identity, UMPRUM. Praha 2017, 271 s.
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This book forum discusses Ivan Kalmar’s pivotal book on the position of “Central Europe” in the racialized hierarchies of “West”/“Europe” and their not-quite-white Others. The authors debate the main contributions and potential blind spots of the book and its key concepts. The concepts of racism and whiteness answer the not-so-new question on Central Europe and Europ’s “East” anew: How come that the populations of and in this diverse region happen to repeatedly find themselves in the very same marginal position in European historical orders? This question has very contemporary manifestations; Europe’s persistent East-West socioeconomic and socio-cultural hierarchies, among others, co-produce the local populations’ marginalized or marginalizing positioning vis-à-vis each other and the rest of Europe or the world. In this honest discussion, the authors chart new intellectual pathways for utilizing racism and whiteness to help us better understand this question and its many manifestations from within and outside the region.
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This article aims to analyze the political, ideological and historical background of the process of changing street names in Belgrade since the fall of communism, with special emphasis placed on the alterations done during the administration of the Serbian Progressive Party (2013–2021). Since the early 1990s, almost every regime change has introduced different interpretations of the national past and present, significantly influencing the Belgrade odonyms, thus making the politics, history and public memory closely intertwined and mutually dependent.
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The aim of this article is to draw attention to the ways in which borderline experience, described in Magdalena Tulli’s postmemory narratives (Włoskie szpilki, Szum), affects embodiment experience. The methods of presenting the unmet need for the closeness of the child with the maternal–traumatised–body and the consequences of the lack of this bond were analysed. The taboo of corporeality and its marginalisation in the narratives indicate the development of defence mechanisms against the traumatic past and, at the same time, become a source of identity problems for the representative of the second generation. Moreover, the close attention paid to Alzheimer’s disease by one of the main characters in Tulli’s novels indicates a close relationship between the way of creating a postmemory narrative and the experience of corporeality.
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