scholarly journals Historical “Truth,” Constructed Memory: Restaging Germany’s Reunification in Thomas Berger’s Television Melodrama Wir sind das Volk. Liebe kennt keine Grenzen (We are the people. Love without limits) (2008)

2012 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 36-49
Author(s):  
Katrin B Mascha
Keyword(s):  
German Society ◽  
Popular Media ◽  
Television Drama ◽  
Historical Reconstruction ◽  
Berlin Wall ◽  
Film And Television ◽  
The Past ◽  
The People ◽  
Award Winning ◽  
Historical Truth

Film and television are popular media for the (re)presentation of history and the depiction of momentous past events. Germany’s reunification is no exception. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Germany has witnessed a proliferation of media production that endeavors to historicize and aestheticize the past. This coincides with the need to forge a post-Wall identity of the new Germany. My discussion of Thomas Berger’s award winning television drama Wir sind das Volk. Liebe kennt keine Grenzen (2008) examines how reunification is presented in a mixture of fictitious elements and authentic historical reconstruction based on shared memories of this past. Following a melodramatic trajectory, the film aims at the reconciliation of German society as a people twenty years after reunification.

scholarly journals MONUMENT IN THE CONTEXT OF HISTORICAL MEMORY

2021 ◽  
pp. 76-85
Author(s):  
I.A. Apollonov ◽  
◽  
A.A. Khlevov ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Intrinsic Value ◽  
Historical Memory ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
Historical Narrative ◽  
Historical Significance ◽  
The Past ◽  
The People ◽  
Historical Monuments ◽  
Level Of Understanding ◽  
Historical Truth

The article examines the problem of the relationship between historical monuments and historical memory. The purpose of the article: to consider the hermeneutical significance of monuments. In this context, the sculptural image is considered as a special way of understanding the past and interpreting history. This approach involves the use of hermeneutical methodology in the study of historical monuments, in which monuments appear to be the assertion of certain values and ideas. The ideas expressed in the monuments connect the past with the present and the future, are the embodiment of the identification symbols of the people and the state. The ideological component of the semantics of historical monuments is investigated. It is shown that the monuments are used to establish a certain political project of power, which is justified by the construction of the corresponding historical narrative. At the same time, monuments appear as sacred symbols of historical memory in its essential aspect, as a fateful connection between the past and the present. The dialogical nature of historical memory is considered. It is proved that the main condition for such dialogicality is the apophatic horizon of historical truth, which allows us to see the unity and integrity of the historical process in the diversity of past events. The penetration into the apophatic horizon of the truth about the past determines the hermeneutic potential of the historical monument as a means of understanding and conceptualizing the memory of the past. The author considers the semantic levels of a historical monument: the external level, which addresses the facticity of a historical person or event, and the artistic content of the monument, which reveals the significance of this facticity. The semantics of the first level is determined by the ideologeme associated with the policy of memorization. The intrinsic value of this level leads to simplification, schematization of the image, turning the monument into a simple memorative sign. The second level involves the expression of the ideological content of history in the monument. Such a level of understanding is based on the personal characteristics of the hero to his specific historical significance and universal universal meanings. Thus, a hermeneutic circle is formed, in which the visual concreteness of the image combines the facticity of a historical person or event and the ideological content of this facticity.

Tarnished memory: ‘Emily’s Story’ and my family tree

2013 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 273-285
Author(s):  
Felicity Collins
Keyword(s):  
Family Tree ◽  
Childhood Memories ◽  
The Past ◽  
Memory Work ◽  
Award Winning ◽  
The Family ◽  
Historical Truth ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
Better Than

What kind of memory-work is generated in settler nations when historians, archivists and television producers shed light on the family tree? What happens to the faithfulness, or reliability, of memory when we imagine the past through compelling figures and scenes that resonate with childhood memories? Why do we need our ancestors, our close relations, to be good, to be better than the history we inherit from them? At stake here, for memory studies, is not the familiar set of tensions between historical truth, empathetic unsettlement and unreliable memory, but the relation between memory, recognition and imagination, or what Terdiman calls the bipolar vocation of memory: ‘to remain focused on the facts and simultaneously to spin off into fantasy’. To probe memory’s bipolar vocation in the decentring of settler subjectivity in Australia, this article begins with the interplay of memory and recollection provoked by ‘Emily’s story’, recounted in McKenna’s award-winning book, Looking for Blackfellas’ Point. It then turns to chastened recognition and the otherness of the past in the Australian version of the UK television format, Who do you think you are? It concludes with Ricoeur and the positing of incognito forgiveness as an alternative to the exoneration of our close relations from the barely hidden crimes of the past – foundational crimes that trouble the politics of reconciliation in settler-colonial nations.

scholarly journals Twentieth Century Totalitarian Regimes, Lustration, and Guilt for Crimes of the Past: Challenges and Dangers for the Strasbourg Court

2019 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 91-116
Author(s):  
Bill Bowring
Keyword(s):  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Basque Country ◽  
Armed Conflicts ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Berlin Wall ◽  
The Past ◽  
Historical Truth ◽  
The Right ◽  
Totalitarian Regimes ◽  
Historical Issues

This article addresses a key contemporary problem confronting the Strasbourg Court. While it is well established that seeking the historical truth is an integral part of the right to freedom of expression, it cannot be the role of the Strasbourg Court to arbitrate underlying historical issues (Dzhugashvili v. Russia, 2014). Still less can it be for the Court to decide on individual or collective guilt for crimes of the past, rather than on violations of Convention rights. For example, the Court has found many violations of human rights in the more recent armed conflicts in Northern Ireland, South-East Turkey, Chechnya, or the Basque Country, but has never sought to pronounce on the legal or moral issues underlying these conflicts, or on their deep historical roots. However, the existence of the ussr for more than 70 years, and 12 years of Nazism in Germany, leading to wwii, dominated the 20th century in Europe. These have both been described as totalitarian regimes. The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 followed by the collapse of the ussr in 1991 led to dramatic changes not only in statehood and political systems, but also a strong desire for states emerging from the ussr or Soviet domination to purge the past, and to identify and punish wrongdoers. Various forms of lustration have been a product of this desire, with the exception of the Russian Federation, where the characterization and proper evaluation of its Soviet past are questions still unresolved. Increasingly the Strasbourg Court has been called on to decide highly controversial cases, for example Ždanoka v. Latvia (2006), Vajnai v. Hungary (2008), Kononov v. Latvia (2010), Korobov v. Estonia (2013), Soro v. Estonia (2015). The author was counsel for the applicants in some of these cases. I ask: what are the dangers and challenges for the Strasbourg Court in adjudicating such cases, and how can it avoid the appearance of taking sides in bitter and intractable arguments?

Suicidal Behavior in Black South Africans

Crisis ◽  
2003 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lourens Schlebusch ◽  
Naseema B.M. Vawda ◽  
Brenda A. Bosch
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Suicidal Behavior ◽  
Health Care Facilities ◽  
South African Society ◽  
South Africans ◽  
The Past ◽  
The People ◽  
Care Facilities ◽  
Black South Africans ◽  
To Come

Summary: In the past suicidal behavior among Black South Africans has been largely underresearched. Earlier studies among the other main ethnic groups in the country showed suicidal behavior in those groups to be a serious problem. This article briefly reviews some of the more recent research on suicidal behavior in Black South Africans. The results indicate an apparent increase in suicidal behavior in this group. Several explanations are offered for the change in suicidal behavior in the reported clinical populations. This includes past difficulties for all South Africans to access health care facilities in the Apartheid (legal racial separation) era, and present difficulties of post-Apartheid transformation the South African society is undergoing, as the people struggle to come to terms with the deleterious effects of the former South African racial policies, related socio-cultural, socio-economic, and other pressures.

What’s Good for George Sánchez Is Good for Boyle Heights: Regenerative Scholarship, Urban Racism, Gentrification, and East LA Interchange

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gilbert Estrada
Keyword(s):  
Working Class ◽  
Urban Pollution ◽  
Metropolitan Regions ◽  
The Past ◽  
Award Winning ◽  
Boyle Heights ◽  
Good For ◽  
Primary Focus ◽  
Deed Restrictions ◽  
Class Community

The inclusive ideals of George Sánchez have helped shape a new generation of academics who have promoted connections with nonacademic organizations. This article discusses how Sánchez has continued these efforts through his pivotal contributions to an award-winning documentary focusing on the multiethnic, working-class community of Boyle Heights: Betsy Kalin’s film East LA Interchange (2015). East LA Interchange’s greatest contribution to the generative scholarship Sánchez emphasizes is its critical analysis of modern urban problems, utilizing history as a tool for social change. The story of Boyle Heights is not just a history of a single working-class community with a diverse culture. It is also a tale of a neighborhood trying to solve real world problems such as gentrification, unaffordable housing, community displacement, and urban pollution. The film portrays these difficulties in the present while showing that they originated decades ago. Sánchez and East LA Interchange are at their best when they provide the historical contexts of contemporary problems, emphasizing that history is not only the study of the past. Rather, history is the unending dialogue between the past, present, and future, and any significant discourse on today’s urban ills must be rooted in the past. For students and others interested in the diverse communities common in many US metropolitan regions, East LA Interchange has much to offer regarding the issues of immigration, redlining, deed restrictions, political activism, freeway construction, living with racially and ethnically diverse community members, and the nationwide problem of gentrification. These themes, especially gentrification, are the primary focus of this article.

The Local Government of Kulon Progo Regency Innovation in Subduing Capitalism through Community Empowerment

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 229
Author(s):  
Muhammad Eko Atmojo ◽  
Helen Dian Fridayani
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Method ◽  
Positive Impact ◽  
Community Empowerment ◽  
Case Study Approach ◽  
Study Approach ◽  
The Past ◽  
The People ◽  
District Government ◽  
The Government

Kulon Progo Regency is one of the districts that has many innovations, one of which is community empowerment in collaboration with a modern shop abbreviated as the shop name owned by the people (tomira). This research was motivated by the achievements of the Kulon Progo district government in carrying out development and innovation in the development of the Kulon Progo region by fully involving the Kulon Progo district community through community empowerment. This initiative was taken by the government of Kulon Progo Regency to improve community empowerment and protect the people of Kulon Progo Regency from various economic threats. Considering that in the past few years many modern shops have mushroomed in each district/city, so this is what makes Kulon Progo Regency move quickly to empower the community by collaborating between MSMEs or cooperative with modern shops. This study uses a qualitative method which case study approach. With the empowerment that has been done, the original products of Kulon Progo Regency or local products can be traded in modern stores so that local products in Kulon Progo Regency can compete with national products in these modern stores. The existence of such cooperation will indirectly improve the image of Kulon Progo Regency and lift the original products of Kulon Progo Regency. The lifting of the original products of Kulon Progo Regency will have a positive impact on the community, where indirectly the economy of the community will increase so that there will be prosperity for the community. Kabupaten Kulon Progo adalah salah satu kabupaten yang memiliki banyak inovasi, salah satunya adalah pemberdayaan masyarakat bekerja sama dengan toko modern disingkat nama toko yang dimiliki oleh masyarakat (tomira). Penelitian ini dilatarbelakangi oleh pencapaian pemerintah kabupaten Kulon Progo dalam melakukan pengembangan dan inovasi dalam pengembangan wilayah Kulon Progo dengan melibatkan sepenuhnya masyarakat kabupaten Kulon Progo melalui pemberdayaan masyarakat. Inisiatif ini diambil oleh pemerintah Kabupaten Kulon Progo untuk meningkatkan pemberdayaan masyarakat dan melindungi masyarakat Kabupaten Kulon Progo dari berbagai ancaman ekonomi. Menimbang bahwa dalam beberapa tahun terakhir banyak toko-toko modern telah menjamur di setiap kabupaten/kota, jadi inilah yang membuat Kabupaten Kulon Progo bergerak cepat untuk memberdayakan masyarakat dengan berkolaborasi antara UMKM atau bekerjasama dengan toko-toko modern. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode penelitian kualitatif dengan pendekatan studi kasus, dengan metode yang digunakan adalah dokumentasi. Dengan pemberdayaan yang telah dilakukan, produk asli Kabupaten Kulon Progo atau produk lokal dapat diperdagangkan di toko modern sehingga produk lokal di Kabupaten Kulon Progo dapat bersaing dengan produk nasional di toko modern ini. Adanya kerjasama tersebut secara tidak langsung akan meningkatkan citra Kabupaten Kulon Progo dan mengangkat produk asli Kabupaten Kulon Progo. Pencabutan produk asli Kabupaten Kulon Progo akan berdampak positif bagi masyarakat, di mana secara tidak langsung perekonomian masyarakat akan meningkat sehingga akan ada kesejahteraan bagi masyarakat.

The Afterlife of a Tribunal

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Diane Orentlicher
Keyword(s):  
Extended Period ◽  
German Society ◽  
Norm Diffusion ◽  
Postwar Germany ◽  
The Past ◽  
Operational Life ◽  
Local Impact

The span of an international tribunal’s local impact is not the same as its operational life, as Germany’s evolved relationship with Nuremberg highlights. Recognizing that the ICTY’s impact in Bosnia and Serbia will continue to evolve after the Tribunal ends its work, this chapter considers the Tribunal’s future impact, focusing in particular on its potential to stimulate a future reckoning with Serbia’s wartime past. While recognizing myriad differences between post-Milošević Serbia and postwar Germany, this chapter explores factors behind the latter’s eventual emergence as a “model penitent” long after German society rejected the moral message the Allies hoped Nuremberg would impart. It suggests that, after an extended period of “transitional denial,” Nuremberg may have contributed to Germany’s far-reaching reckoning with the past through a process of delayed norm diffusion.

(Anamnesis) Revolting Bodies: “Le Forgeron” and the Poetry of the Past

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert St. Clair
Keyword(s):  
Victor Hugo ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Past ◽  
The People ◽  
Political Struggles ◽  
Louis Xvi

weChapter 4 takes up the question of poetry and engagement at its most explicit and complex in Rimbaud, focusing on a long, historical epic entitled “Le Forgeron.” We read this poem, which recreates and re-imagines a confrontation between the People in revolt and Louis XVI in the summer of 1792, as Rimbaud’s attempt to add a revolutionary supplement to the counter-epics modeled by Victor Hugo in Châtiments. Chapter 4 shows how Rimbaud’s “Forgeron” challenges us to examine the ways in which a poem might seek “to enjamb” the caesura between poiesis and praxis by including and complicating revolutionary (counter)history into its folds in order to implicate itself in the political struggles of its time.

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