scholarly journals Croatianess and Children’s Popular Culture

2021 ◽  
Vol 51 (44) ◽  
pp. 163-185
Author(s):  
Zlatko Bukač

This paper examines the discursive formation of Croatianness (hrvatstvo) during the Croatian War of Independence in the 1990s and the post-war era, focusing mainly on the domain of popular culture. In this analysis of Croatian children’s popular culture, the main emphasis is on chocolate bar stickers and sticker albums manufactured by Kraš. At the time, the company had published Cro-Army chocolate stickers and the accompanying Croatian army sticker album, Knights’ Tales, about Croatian history and various historical events, and Maki, a sticker album of Catholic saints. In relying on theoretical and methodological frameworks of representational and discourse theory regarding national identity and fantasy, this paper shows one of the ways in which Croatianness was formed in children’s popular culture through three main aspects – war, history, and religion

Fluminensia ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-37
Author(s):  
Vlad Beronja

This article examines Daša Drndić's April in Berlin (April u Berlinu, 2007), alongside the author’s other Holocaust novels, as literary responses to historical revisionism and outright denialism of the Holocaust in Croatia, which had emerged into the political and cultural mainstream during the War of Independence (1991-1995) and has persisted into the post-war period. Since the historical legacy of the Fascist NDH in Croatia has been de-traumatized, it no longer represents a crisis of historical consciousness, which would entail a confrontation with the violent past as well as a painful transformation of national identity and the political space in which this identity is articulated. In contrast to de-traumatization, as an ethnocentric strategy that normalizes the nation’s fascist crimes, Drndić’s novels stage a shocking confrontation with the shards of the violent past. Through both their innovative graphic layout and interdiscursive textuality—which combines historiographical narration with avant-garde fictional and artistic devices, words with image—Drndić’s novels function as literary archives and monuments, and archives as monuments, intended to disturb, disrupt, and jolt the reader into awareness of traumatic history, laying bare the ideological mechanisms of political control and bringing the bodies of victims to our doorstep.


Author(s):  
Tina Pippin

The Rapture is the sudden and hoped for event of the second coming of Jesus Christ in the clouds to raise true Christian believers to heaven. American popular culture has played with this scenario in a variety of genres (e.g., television, film, novels), most often in a satirical way. From the faith perspective, the Rapture is a major theme in Christian fiction (the Left Behind series) and follows a timeline of political and historical events. Representations of the Rapture in popular culture often reflect the current political climate and the psychological anxiety, isolation, and sense of persecution of believers.


Humanities ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 71
Author(s):  
Marianna Charitonidou

The article examines an ensemble of gender and migrant roles in post-war Neorealist and New Migrant Italian films. Its main objective is to analyze gender and placemaking practices in an ensemble of films, addressing these practices on a symbolic level. The main argument of the article is that the way gender and migrant roles were conceived in the Italian Neorealist and New Migrant Cinema was based on the intention to challenge certain stereotypes characterizing the understanding of national identity and ‘otherness’. The article presents how the roles of borgatari and women function as devices of reconceptualization of Italy’s identity, providing a fertile terrain for problematizing the relationship between migration studies, urban studies and gender studies. Special attention is paid to how migrants are related to the reconceptualization of Italy’s national narrations. The Neorealist model is understood here as a precursor of the narrative strategies that one encounters in numerous films belonging to the New Migrant cinema in Italy. The article also explores how certain aspects of more contemporary studies of migrant cinema in Italy could illuminate our understanding of Neorealist cinema and its relation to national narratives. To connect gender representation and migrant roles in Italian cinema, the article focuses on the analysis of the status of certain roles of women, paying particular attention to Anna Magnagi’s roles.


With its five thematic sections covering genres from cantorial to classical to klezmer, this pioneering multi-disciplinary volume presents rich coverage of the work of musicians of Jewish origin in the Polish lands. It opens with the musical consequences of developments in Jewish religious practice: the spread of hasidism in the eighteenth century meant that popular melodies replaced traditional cantorial music, while the greater acculturation of Jews in the nineteenth century brought with it synagogue choirs. Jewish involvement in popular culture included performances for the wider public, Yiddish songs and the Yiddish theatre, and contributions of many different sorts in the interwar years. Chapters on the classical music scene cover Jewish musical institutions, organizations, and education; individual composers and musicians; and a consideration of music and Jewish national identity. One section is devoted to the Holocaust as reflected in Jewish music, and the final section deals with the afterlife of Jewish musical creativity in Poland, particularly the resurgence of interest in klezmer music. The chapters do not attempt to define what may well be undefinable—what “Jewish music” is. Rather, they provide an original and much-needed exploration of the activities and creativity of “musicians of the Jewish faith.“


2021 ◽  
Vol 94 ◽  
pp. 03007
Author(s):  
Olga V. Semaeva

The article deals with the issues of forming a patriotic attitude of young Russian citizens to their country. The paper analyzes the results of various sociological studies that indicate that measures to form patriotism among the younger generation are not sufficiently effective and considers the causes underlying this situation. The article analyzes important historical events that determined the vector of development of the Russian state in different historical epochs and the activity of Patriotic citizens of Russia, who chose national values over the ideology promoted by political elites. The article presents the results of a survey conducted among students of of Plekhanov Russian University of Economics, the purpose of which was to determine the attitude of modern University students to the problem of national identification and patriotism.


Author(s):  
Ziad Fahed

The post-war period in Lebanon brought to the open all sensitive subjects that have marked the history of Lebanon: how to avoid falling into such a crisis? How not repeating such war? How can the Lebanese society eradicate the reasons that may lead to any other war? The Lebanese crisis had challenged the Church inviting her to move from being a passive witness to an active participant in the peaceful struggle for the liberation of the Lebanese society and help the country to complete its incorrect reading of history. Can the Maronite Patriarchate have a positive role in this regard? Can the Maronite Patriarchate bring about the purifi cation of the memory in a multiconfessional country? In this paper, and after defi ning the meaning of the purifi cation of memory in the Lebanese context, we will consider the important challenges that must precede any serious and defi nitive solution to the crisis in Lebanon and how can the Lebanese Church contribute in the development of a national identity and in the building of a new state free from any kind of domination. The purpose of this paper is not to justify what has happened in the past 34 years, i.e. since the beginning of the Lebanese war, but to contribute in searching for a sustainable peace.


1994 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-107
Author(s):  
Salustiano del Campo ◽  
Enrique Gil-Calvo

It may be argued that the solidity of a country's popular culture (and hence its capacity to resist penetration by foreign cultural forms) depends on its inhabitants' consciousness of sharing a common national identity: a highly nationalistic society will successfully repel alien cultural invasions while a society with a weak national consciousness will easily absorb extraneous cultural forms. It must be noted that the national identity referred to is a historical construction contingent upon the element of conflict, competition or opposition that has characterized the country's relations with its neighbours throughout generations.


2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Bain-Selbo ◽  
D. Gregory Sapp

Readers are introduced to a range of theoretical and methodological approaches used to understand religion – including sociology, philosophy, psychology, and anthropology – and how they can be used to understand sport as a religious phenomenon. Topics include the formation of powerful communities among fans and the religious experience of the fan, myth, symbols and rituals and the sacrality of sport, and sport and secularization. Case studies are taken from around the world and include the Olympics (ancient and modern), football in the UK, the All Blacks and New Zealand national identity, college football in the American South, and gymnastics. [new paragraph] Ideal for classroom use, Understanding Sport as a Religious Phenomenon illuminates the nature of religion through sports phenomena and is a much-needed contribution to the field of religion and popular culture.


Author(s):  
Cecilia Tossounian

Chapter 2 studies how the flapper, the archetypical modern girl, was construed by popular culture in the 1920s and 1930s. Mass media was engaged in a debate about the defining traits of the American flapper and her Argentine counterpart. While the flapper inhabited a distant land, the joven moderna combined popular fashions and mannerisms both foreign and domestic. Portrayed as an upper-class character, she went beyond the traditional female role of the devoted daughter. An oversimplified media construction, the Argentine flapper alerted the public of the dangerous effects of international consumer capitalism and Americanization on gender and national identity.


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