“Nobody asked me how I felt”. Childhood Memories of Exile among the Croatian post-WW2 Diaspora in Argentina

Author(s): Nikolina Židek / Language(s): English / Issue: 1/2021

This paper focuses on childhood memories of exile over time. While researching commemorative practices of the Croatian post-WW2 émigré community in Argentina, we mainly find adult (and predominantly male) voices on the trauma of the military and political defeat. It is therefore essential to analyse how the 1.5 generation—those who arrived in Argentina as children—narrate their childhood memory of exile. This research employs qualitative methodological tools of discourse and narrative analysis, studying personal testimonies, gathered through semistructured interviews with members of the 1.5 generation, combined with written, photographic, and audiovisual material. The results of the research show that child memories are not exclusively personal or biographical, but overlap with family and collective memories of the émigré community, especially when it comes to making intellectual sense of their exile experience, even seven decades later. Even though the majority felt uprooted from Croatia and accepted Argentina as their home, in order to make sense of their (personal and family) suffering, they merge their community history with official history, and justify the reasons for their parents’ struggle, without any critical questioning of their parents’ role in the Second World War. This subsequently gives way to a monolithic narrative that is perpetuated through generations.

“Our Victims Define Our Borders”: Commemorating Yugoslav Partisans in the Italo-Yugoslav Borderland

Author(s): Borut Klabjan / Language(s): English / Issue: 02/2017

This article discusses local cultures of remembrance of Yugoslav partisans fallen during World War II in Trieste, now part of Italy, and investigates the role of memory activists in managing vernacular memory over time. The author analyses the interplay between memory and the production of space, something which has been neglected in other studies of memory formation. On the basis of local newspaper articles, archival material, and oral interviews, the essay examines the ideological imprint on the local cultural landscape, contributing to a more complex understanding of memory engagement. The focus is on grassroots initiatives rather than state-sponsored heritage projects. This article argues that memory initiatives are not solely the outcome of national narratives and top–down ideological impositions. It shows that official narratives have to negotiate with vernacular forms of memory engagement in the production of a local mnemonic landscape.

“Srbe treba na neki način zastrašiti”. Miniranje civilnih objekata na području Bjelovara 1991. — 1995.

Author(s): Nikola Vukobratović / Language(s): Croatian / Issue: 2/2021

Intensive inter-ethnic violence against civilians is one of the key characteristics of wars conducted on the territory of former Yugoslavia during the 1990s. Besides war crimes committed during military operations, examples of inter-ethnic violence include various forms of treatment of ethnic Others in areas not directly affected by war. The author uses the campaign of blasting of civilian objects in and around the town of Bjelovar in Croatia as a case-study. The research is the first historiographical attempt of reconstruction of events in Bjelovar, based od juridical, police and other documents, as well as witness-statements. Applying Mila Dragojević's concept of amoral community, the author explains the motives and reasoning behind this type of inter-ethnic violence.

“Vendi i dëshmisë dhe kujtesës” në Shkodër si një formë e re kulturore e përkujtimit

Author(s): Ermela Broci / Language(s): Albanian / Issue: 2/2019

The museum of memory contours a new shape of memory and a new form of the museums in Albania. Although, in Southern Europe, this kind of museum is widely spread, there are very few museums in Albania dedicated to the Communist period. This article focuses on why and how the societies agree with the past and the violence through the creation of the museum of memory as a new form of the memorial museum. It is investigated not only the features of communism through the present museum but thoroughly the overall practices of the process of memory within a museum. The Museum of Memory, in Shkodra, northern Albania, is taken as a case study. It is investigated its alterations through years starting as a cultural and education center during 1930-1946, later in 1946 - 1992 used as a political prison and then transformed into a memory museum (2014) to commemorate the crimes of communism and make them known to the public.

„Alle lebten von Fluchtgedanken“. Gedächtnis und Identität in Herta Müllers Herztier

Author(s): László V. Szabó / Language(s): German / Issue: 3/2021

The paper argues that Herta Müller’s novel Herztier (1994) can be regarded in a certain intercultural sense as an “erratic block” (term used by Kimmerle also 1994), as the historic period constituting the background of the novel, namely, the Ceauşescu-dictatorship in Romania before 1989, may appear from the perspective of today’s reader as strange as an African culture, or that of mediaeval Europe. Müller’s novel also proves how different the history and culture of certain European regions can be from one another. Moreover, cultural and mental divergences can prevail and endure also after crossing political borders as experienced by Herta Müller when leaving Romania for Germany in 1987. Finally, the paper discusses questions of cultural memory and space, looking for traces of a poetics of memory (also expressed in the motif of flight) in Herztier.

„an die besten Traditionen der Ersten und Zweiten Republik anknüpfend“ : Polnische Erinnerungskultur im öffentlichen Raum nach 1989

Author(s): Heidi Hein-Kircher / Language(s): German / Issue: 3/2010

In the early years of what is generally known as the Third Republic, which was brought to an end by the 1997 Constitution, the politics of history and memory reflected the new Polish society’s search for a fresh conception of itself, a conception that would displace that of communist times. To this end a specific effort towards the creation and search for historical continuities was characteristic of this stage: new and renewed national themes, new and renewed rituals, symbols and political myths formed important elements in political psychology and political culture. These were not only used to create a new identity, but also to legitimise the revolution and the new political system. As will be shown, the historical memory of the Second Republic, in particular of its founder and dictator Józef Piłsudski, as well as of the (negatively perceived) Soviet occupation and hegemony over Poland, became the focus of the politics of memory in public discourse. In this process, the problematic history of German-Polish relations was all but excluded, in order to build up a new, positive national image, as well as from political necessity, in the efforts to join NATO and the EU. The memory of the German crimes committed during the Second World War was now – in contrast to position in the communist era – just one element in historical consciousness and collective memory. Hence the culture of memory as a whole was characterised on the one hand by linking up with the historical traditions of the Second Republic, and on the other by attempts to remove the boundaries to the culture of memory set under communism. Thus the change in the culture of memory reflects political change, i.e. the change of system, as Poles were now able to set their own markers in the culture of memory. Since the end of the 1990s, it has become ever clearer that what was really happening was a form of suppression of historical memory, especially with regard to German-Polish relations.

„Die Sprache hat also ihren Ort.“ Zur Mehrsprachigkeit von Maja Haderlaps Roman Engel des Vergessens

Author(s): Dieter Neidlinger,Silke Pasewalck / Language(s): German / Issue: 1/2021

Based on philological research on multilingualism and with regard to Maja Haderlap’s literary work in general this article deals with the specific form of multilingualism that can be observed in her novel Engel des Vergessens (2011). Maja Haderlap, born 1961 in Bad Eisenkappel/Železna Kapla, Carinthia (region in southern Austria), grew up with two languages, Slovenian and German. The authors of the article pursue the question to what degree her literary work and especially her novel can be characterised as multilingual and what kind of poetic multilingualism can be found there. They focus on the novel’s narrative and on the use of language(s), with a short historical excursus on the Slovenian minority in Carinthia as well as the difficult memory politics in Austria. Maja Haderlap not only writes about the territorial and historical preconditions of multilingualism in Carinthia but also inscribes these conditions in the text itself, characterising both the narrative and the language. Although the novel is the result of a shift from Slovenian to German, its multilingualism can be analysed on different levels: on the level of the relationship between discours and histoire – to refer to Genette’s narratological terms –, on the level of cultural codes of the Slovenian language within the novel’s German text, and in general with regard to the fact, that the text is written with the modes of expression of Slovenian and German or with the help of the ‘no man’s land’ between the languages. One can therefore – with respect to the terms of philological research – find both obvious and latent multilingualism and, thirdly, one can observe Mehr-Sprachlichkeit, a term that has been defined by Silke Pasewalck in previous articles.

„ŁEMKO NOSI BÓL W GENACH” OBLICZE ŁEMKOWSKIEJ POSTPAMIĘCI

Author(s): Janina Hajduk-Nijakowska / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 70/2021

The material being presented in this paper is a study case – the analysis of an interview which the author conducted with a granddaughter of the Lemkos displaced to Lower Silesia in 1947 as part of Operation Vistula. The narration of the interlocutor overfilled with emotions reveals the traumatic context of her incessant search for an answer to the question: Who am I? Since she did not agree to make the entirety of her talk public, transferring in this way the obligation to protect her name onto the author, the interview became a unique personal experience for the latter at the same time. Therefore, only those fragments of the above-mentioned interview are referred to in the text, which can be juxtaposed against opinions and sentiments of other Lemkos of the third generation. The aim is to make precise the contemporary picture of the Lemkos’ family-based post-memory that is burdened with the sense of harm and humiliation.

„LINIE UCIECZKI CIĄGNIE SIĘ ZA SOBĄ PRZEZ CAŁE ŻYCIE”. POSTPAMIĘĆ, STAROŚĆ I ZAPOMNIENIE W POWIEŚCI ULRIKE DRAESNER SIEBEN SPRÜNGE VOM RAND DER WELT (2014)

Author(s): Katarzyna Śliwińska / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 70/2021

In contemporary German literature, particularly in the family novels that are key to the post-memory discourse of the past, there is a marked interest in the dysfunctions and deformations of memory associated with ageing processes. Demographic changes lead researchers to consider the determinants and the existing dominant themes and categories of interdisciplinary memory studies. Ulrike Draesner’s 2014 novel, Sieben Sprünge vom Rand der Welt, the subject of this paper, probes the meanders of memory and forgetting, examining their configurations in intergenerational relations. I am interested here in the threads that have been marginalized in the popular discourse on the flight and resettlement of millions of Germans from the eastern provinces of the Reich, which emerge along with the progressive dementia of one of the novel’s main characters.

„Nasze” i„odziedziczone” muzea – PiS i Fidesz jako mnemoniczni wojownicy

Author(s): Ljiljana Radonić / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 4/2020

PiS and Fidesz are mnemonic warriors who tried to enforce their memory politics already during their first government terms – as the analysis of their flagship museums, the Warsaw Rising Museum and the House of Terror in Budapest shows. The current illiberal governments treat museums they ‘inherited’ from their predecessors differently: While PiS changes content at the Museum of the Second World War in Gdańsk, the Museum of the History of Polish Jews and the Holocaust Memorial Center in Budapest ‘only’ lost their directors. Even mnemonic warriors must take international developments like the ‘universalization of the Holocaust’ into consideration. Kaczyński and Orbán favored opening new museums rather than changing museums identified as ‘Jewish’, even those that explicitly deal with Polish and Hungarian complicity. New museums, like the Ulma Family Museum, the House of Fates in Budapest and the Warsaw Ghetto Museum, focus on rescuers of Jews and heroic uplifting messages.

„Rozważania o krzywdzie”. Wątki polityki historycznej w publicystyce Adama Michnika

Author(s): Łukasz Tomasz Sroka / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 2/2008

„Serdecznie dziękujemy za przybliżenie nam historii Polaków ratujących Żydów”. Recepcja polskich muzeów „Sprawiedliwych” w świetle wpisów w księgach gości – Apteka pod Orłem, Willa Żabińskich, Muzeum Ulmów

Author(s): Zofia Wóycicka / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 4/2020

The last decade has seen the establishment of no less than three historical exhibitions about Poles who rescued Jews during World War II: Tadeusz Pankiewicz’s Eagle Pharmacy in Cracow (2013), the Żabiński Villa in Warsaw (2015) and the Ulma Family Museum of Poles Saving Jews in World War II in Markowa (2016). While these museums tackle similar issues, they differ both in the way they present their narratives and in how they present their exhibits. Examines their reception, Wóycicka asks what the intended message could be according to visitors; she asks whom and what they are supposed to commemorate. This analysis and comparison of entries in the guestbook allow her to demonstrate that despite the thematic overlap their reception is widely different.

„Tamsusis paveldas“: memorialai, kontroversijos ir Macikų lagerių atvejis

Author(s): Vygantas Vareikis / Language(s): Lithuanian / Issue: 3/2021

The article, based on general methodological approaches applicable in the theories of memorial culture and places of memory and historiographical materials, provides an analysis of the interaction between the “dark heritage” and the discourses shaping the politics of history, the uses of the “dark heritage” objects and the site of the Macikai camps. The article gives an historical overview of the Macikai camps and provides an account of the current state of research of the “dark heritage”, and the heritage of military and defence works in Lithuania. It examines the creation of Holocaust memorials as examples of European “dark heritage” and related controversies, and includes recommendations for the patterns of representation and content of exhibitions at the “dark heritage” Macikai site.

„Úgy éreztük, hogy a magyar emigráns szervezetek vezetői Amerikában a múltban élnek, és ellentétes politikai céljaikkal szétforgácsolják a közösségeinket. Elhatároztuk, hogy ezen mi változtatni fogunk”

Ludányi Andrással Gazsó Dániel beszélget

Author(s): Dániel Gazsó / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 3/2019

„Wypędzenie ze Wschodu” w postpamięciowych tekstach literatury niemieckiej

Author(s): Katarzyna Śliwińska / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 65/2020

This paper analyses post-memory narratives concerning the loss of the eastern provinces of the Reich as well as the flight and expulsion of their German inhabitants as found in the novels of German writers born in the 1950s and 1960s: Hans-Ulrich Treichel’s ‘Der Verlorene’ (1998) and ‘Anatolin’ (2008), Reinhard Jirgl’s ‘Die Unvollendeten’ (2003) and Ulrike Draesner’s ‘Sieben Sprünge vom Rand der Welt’ (2014). These stories showing far-reaching consequences of the ‘expulsion from the East’ examine complex mechanisms through which traumatic knowledge about the past is handed down from generation to generation. Consequently, the paper focuses on how the German authors make use of motifs characterizing post-memory or post-traumatic discourse about mourning and loss, and the way the key figures of that discourse structure their texts.

„Освобождение“ и „държавно изграждане“ в българските идеологически парадигми

Author(s): Nikolay Krastev / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 1/2019

The objective of this paper is to analyse the transformation of the political conceptions of “liberation” and “state building” in the ideological paradigms in Bulgaria. At the background of the genesis of the concepts in the classical ideological systems, using the comparative method, the paper reveals the contradiction between their classical reading and that of the Bulgarian political actors. We conclude that the “Liberation”, a traditional liberal concept with a negative definition is opposed by the Bulgarian liberals to “freedom” and is given positive meanings while the Bulgarian left and nationalistic right tend to prefer the liberal understanding of the term to the traditional positive socialist ones.

„Предметите говорят“ – споделени наследства и съучастие на публики

Author(s): Nikolay Nenov,Silvia Trifonova-Kostadinova / Language(s): Bulgarian / Issue: 3/2019

Sharing heritage is an important process in society, where a narrative makes transmission and turns in a vehicle for the understanding of both past and present. The text presents the contemporary practices of object oriented museology. Using the exhibits with history in Russe Museum, an exposition and museum educational module are produced. On the basis of the principles of the co-participatory museum, a dialogical environment is built in which the artefacts are not only witnesses of time, but also an inspiration for creativity. Russe Museum explores the relationship between cultural heritage and local development with the participation of the Museum as an environment for communication between different social actors, local communities and shared knowledge. In this process object oriented museology gives the possibility to re-conceptualize the ways of change of the approaches connected to communication through heritage. In its core stays the active public, which is part of the local community.

№316 Mocarstwowy mit wojny we współczesnej polityce zagranicznej Kremla

Author(s): Maria Domańska / Language(s): Polish

Sakralizacja sowieckiego zwycięstwa nad nazizmem stanowi centralny element rosyjskiej polityki historycznej i jeden z wątków w ofensywie ideologicznej obliczonej na legitymizację współczesnych ambicji mocarstwowych Rosji. Mesjanistyczny mit zbawienia świata od absolutnego zła ma wybielać bądź unieważniać ciemne karty historii Związku Sowieckiego oraz legitymizować wszystkie późniejsze wojny, łącznie z interwencjami wojskowymi na Węgrzech, w Czechosłowacji czy Afganistanie, aż do udziału we współczesnych konfliktach – agresji przeciwko Ukrainie i interwencji w Syrii. Zgodnie ze współczesną, neosowiecką wykładnią wszystkie one miały charakter defensywny i były uzasadnione zewnętrznym kontekstem. Faktyczna apoteoza ładu jałtańskiego i usprawiedliwianie przemocy w polityce międzynarodowej mają służyć realizacji współczesnych interesów strategicznych Moskwy, do których należą przede wszystkim hegemonia na obszarze posowieckim i przebudowa europejskiej architektury bezpieczeństwa. Mitologia wojenna i ambicje mocarstwowe są wciąż nośne w społeczeństwie rosyjskim i pomagają legitymizować autorytarny reżim mimo pogłębiających się problemów społeczno-ekonomicznych. W mniejszym stopniu mit wojennego „braterstwa broni” oddziałuje na kraje posowieckie, coraz bardziej dystansujące się – zwłaszcza po 2014 r. – od neoimperialnej narracji historycznej Moskwy. W najmniejszym stopniu historyczna soft power Kremla znajduje oddźwięk w Europie i USA, co nie umniejsza wagi stojących przed Zachodem wyzwań związanych z prowadzoną tam przez Rosję wojną informacyjno-psychologiczną opartą na falsyfikowaniu historii i konstruowaniu paraleli między współczesną polityką międzynarodową i napięciami lat trzydziestych XX wieku.

№316 The myth of the Great Patriotic War as a tool of the Kremlin’s great power policy

Author(s): Maria Domańska / Language(s): English

The sacralised Soviet victory over Nazism is a central element of the politics of memory, as utilised by the Russian state today. It constitutes an important theme in the Kremlin’s ideological offensive that is intended to legitimise Russia’s great-power ambitions. The messianic myth of saving the world from absolute evil is supposed to cover up the darker chapters of Soviet history and to legitimise all subsequent Soviet or Russian wars and military interventions, starting with Hungary, through Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan and ending with Ukraine and Syria. According to the current neo-Soviet interpretation, all these military actions were purely defensive and justified by external circumstances. The glorification of the “Yalta order” and the justification of the use of force in foreign policy is intended to legitimise Moscow’s pursuit of its current strategic aims, first and foremost of these being hegemony in the post-Soviet area and revision of the European security architecture. The war mythology and Russia’s great-power ambitions continue to resonate with the wider Russian public; thus contributing to legitimisation of the authoritarian regime in the eyes of a large swathe of society and offsetting the effect of growing socio-economic problems. The myth of a wartime ‘brotherhood of arms’ has a smaller impact on other post-Soviet states, which have increasingly been distancing themselves – especially since 2014 – from Moscow’s neo-imperial historical narrative. The use of historical myths as a form of soft power finds even less resonance in Europe and the US. Nevertheless, low susceptibility in the West to Russian historical propaganda does not diminish the gravity of the challenge posed by Russian information-psychological warfare, resorting to historical falsehoods and specious analogies between the current international situation and political-military tensions of the 1930s.

ХУДОЖНЄ ОФОРМЛЕННЯ МАСОВИХ СВЯТ КИЄВА РАДЯНСЬКОГО ПЕРІОДУ: 60–80-і роки ХХ ст.

Author(s): Iryna Maslova-Lysychkina / Language(s): Ukrainian / Issue: 1/2014

In the article are researched peculiarities of mass celebrations setting in 60-80's of the XX century in Kyiv. There is established that mass celebrations in Kyiv had mainly state and official character of the period. In this regard the setting of celebrations (posters, banners, portraits, stands, musical accompaniment and theatrical performance) subordinated to the ideological content and had propagandistic trend.The article outlines that the Soviet past of Ukraine further largely continues to define our mentality, mode of life, pattern of behavior in society. One of those Soviet "remnants" in Ukrainian society is some mass celebrations. It is states that in general the phenomenon of mass celebrations is an important part of social and cultural realities of our time and used as a communication technology, as a method of consolidation of various communities and way of broadcasting a variety of social ideas.The aim of the article is the study of specific setting of mass celebrations in Kyiv during Soviet period in 60-80 years of the XX century.The most developed in domestic scientific researches is ethno-cultural aspect of holiday phenomenon (V. Borysenko, M. Havryluk, M. Zakovych, S. Zubkov, O. Kurochkin, P. Sokolov, I. Sukhanov). Holiday as a social phenomenon studied Y. Belousov, D. Genkin, K. Zhyhulskyy, A. Mazaev, E. Kaverina, A. Nekrylova, O. Nemyro, A. Piotrowski, V. Propp, S. Turin, D. Uhrynovych, N. Hrenov, O. Shcherbynin, and L. Shumikhina. Specificity of holiday as a symbolic form of culture reveals O. Popravko. In scientific studies of T. Gayevska and J. Slutskaya holidays analyzed as a part of Soviet culture. Some aspects of mass celebrations setting in Eastern Ukraine in the 60's and 80's of the XX century studied O. Penkova.At the beginning the article proved that mass celebrations played an important role in Soviet culture. Besides the entertainment function they had ideological significance. Soviet ideologists V. Lenin, N. Krupska, A. Lunacharsky and others emphasized the importance of consolidation official and national celebrations as a part of cultural state development and ideological activities. Since the early 60's of the XX century began a new stage in the development of mass celebrations, which were caused by profound political changes in the Soviet Union after the 20th Congress of the Communist Party. According to the O. Penkova’s research in this period, "the state returns to human beings at the first time". However, mass celebrations in the USSR kept its state and political character. The state established official holidays and was trying to turn them into public tradition. According to the Decree of the USSR Supreme Soviet "About the holidays and memorable dates" from the 1st of October 1980 to the category of nationwide celebrations were included the anniversary of the October Revolution – on 7–8 November, V. Lenin's Birthday – on 22 April, International Day of Worker's Solidarity (Labour Day) – on 1–2 May, Victory Day of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War of 1941–1945 – on 9 May, USSR Constitution Day – on 7 October, National Day of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics – on 30 December, Day of the Soviet Army and Navy – on 23 February, International Women's Day – on 8 March.Then the article passes to the statement that the state established official holidays and was trying to turn them into public tradition. The special feature of these key holidays was a clear organization that carried out by apparatus structures of the Communist Party. Commissions were engaged in preparation for the holiday, which were created in all steps of the party vertical. The trade unions, The Young Communist League (komsomol), the administrations of enterprises and institutions also carried out decisions of the party apparatus. The basic forms of the mass celebrations were meetings and demonstrations during the 60-80's of the XX century in Kyiv. Together with parades of various kinds (military, sports, etc.) they were the main forms of expression festive aesthetics of the Soviet era. Involvement to the celebration of state holidays began with early childhood. The main form of mass state holidays in Kyiv were demonstrations of workers that took place on the 7th of November and the 1st of May. The celebration of the 1500th anniversary of Kyiv in 1982 became a significant mass celebration in Kyiv in the Soviet period as well.In the conclusions is revealed that setting of mass celebrations is closely associated with ideological content of the Soviet period (the 60-70's of the XX century). In Kyiv such mass celebrations as Victory Day, May Day, Day of the October Revolution and others necessarily were held in the form of meetings and demonstrations. At the time of the events constantly were used state symbols, portraits of leaders and senior communist party leaders, Heroes of the Great Patriotic War and the Socialist Labor. In order to ensure solemnity and emotionality in the setting of mass celebrations were applied large stands depicting the Kyiv emblem or symbols of Kyiv enterprises. Banners with slogans, posters, music of patriotic character, elements of theatrical performances involving athletics and choreographic groups were also widely used.