Multiplicity in European Memory

The aim of the course is:
To provide a broad overview of contemporary theoretical and conceptual approaches that address processes of historicization and/or memorialization in contemporary European society.
To develop students' critical thinking about the different processes of social memory creation and the "uses" of history.

Competencies:
Students develop skills in written and oral academic argumentation and discussion.
Students develop skills in critical thinking, media literacy, and the use of digital humanities resources.

/

Drawing on the vast field of memory studies, the course examines processes of memorialisation that are mutually contrasting, conflicting, dialogical and/or exclusionary, thus suggesting significantly different historical interpretations and political imaginaries. It takes the framework of Europe not only as a set of geographical foci, but also as a political and normative framework that constructs particular ideas of Europe. Both conceptions are critically assessed.

The course navigates students through various schools of thought on social/collective memories as negotiated, narrativized, politically mobilised, and a matter of affective engagement. It introduces concepts such as 'multidirectional memory' and 'communicative memory', as well as political debates on issues such as 'the paradigm of two European totalitarianisms' and 'European memory'. It critically discusses ideas of 'divided memory', 'conflict' and 'reconciliation' of memories, historical responsibility, history and justice, truth and denial. In addition, the division between political and family memories (public and private) is approached (also) as a gendered process.

Themes:
Influential concepts in the field of memory studies
Pan-European political memory projects (cases of Holocaust, post-socialism, anti/colonialism etc.)
Post-war reckoning with the past (cases of Germany, Yugoslavia, etc.)
Ideas of historical justice and responsibility
Normative approaches to collective memory and its critique
Strategies of public memorialisation (museums, commemorations, “memory laws”, etc.)
Actors of memorialisation (public, official, civil-society, vernacular, memory activism, etc.)
Gendered aspects of memorialisation
Print, electronic, and digital media and memory practices

After passing the exam, the student will:
Acquire a basic understanding of the concepts and academic paradigms within memory studies and other theoretical approaches that address the historicization and/or memory making in contemporary societies.
Critically write different types of texts (term papers, essays) in dialogue with critical reading of academic literature and primary sources.
Acquire basic methods of analysing practices of remembering, media and visual analysis, and become familiar with the range of digital humanities and gender-sensitive approaches.

• Assmann, Jan. “Communicative and Cultural Memory.” V: Communicative and Cultural Memory, Astrid Erll & Ansgar Nünning (ur.), 109–18. De Gruyter, 2008. E-version
• Brousek, Jan, Danijel Grafenauer, Werner Wintersteiner & Daniel Wutti (ur.). Slovenija - Österreich: Befreiendes Erinnern = Osvobajajoče spominjanje: Dialogische Aufarbeitung der Vergangenheit = Dialoško obravnavanje zgodovine. Klagenfurt / Celovec: Drava, 2020.
• Daskalova, Krassimira, Maria Bucur, Ivana Pantelić, Biljana Dojčinović, Gabriela Dudeková, Sabina Žnidaršič Žagar, Nina Vodopivec, Şirin Tekeli & Oksana Kis. “Clio on the Margins: Women’s and Gender History in Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe (Part One).” Aspasia 6, no. 1 (2012): 125–185. E-version
• Ghodsee, Kristen. “Tale of ‘Two Totalitarianisms’: The Crisis of Capitalism and the Historical Memory of Communism.” History of the Present: A Journal of Critical History 4, no. 2 (2014): 115–142. E-version
• Karstedt, Susanne (ur.). Legal Institutions and Collective Memories. Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2009. Catalogue
• Kuljić, Todor. Kultura spominjanja. Ljubljana: Znanstvena založba Filozofske fakultete UL, 2012. Catalogue
• McDowell, Sara & Máire Braniff. “Landscapes of Commemoration: The Relationship between Memory, Place and Space.” V: Commemoration as Conflict: Space, Memory and Identity in Peace Processes, 12-25. Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014.
• Mihajlović Trbovc, Jovana & Tamara Pavasović Trošt. “Who Were the Anti-Fascists? Divergent Interpretation of WWII in Contemporary Post-Yugoslav History Textbooks.” V: The Use and Abuse of Memory: Interpreting World War II in Contemporary European Politics, ur. Christian Karner & Bram Mertens, 173–92. Abingdon & New York: Routledge, 2017.
• Milošević, Ana & Philippe Perchoc. “The European Parliament and memory politics: exploring the constellation of actors.” Politique européenne 71, no. 1 (2021): 6–27.
• Olick, Jeffrey K., “The Politics of Regret: Analytical Frames” in The Politics of Regret: On Collective Memory and Historical Responsibility, 121-151. Routledge, 2007.
• Petrović, Tanja. Towards an affective history of Yugoslavia. Filozofija i društvo 27, no. 3 (2016): 502-520. E-version
• Petrović, Tanja. The political dimension of post-socialist memory practices: self-organized choirs in the former Yugoslavia. V: Defragmenting Yugoslavia, ur. Irena Ristić, 315-329. Regensburg: Südost-Institut. 2011. E-version
• Rothberg, Michael. Multidirectional Memory: Remembering the Holocaust in the Age of Decolonization. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2009. Catalogue
• Sierp, Aline. “EU Memory Politics and Europe’s Forgotten Colonial Past.” Interventions 22, no. 6 (2020): 686–702. E-version
• Todorova, Maria, ed. Remembering Communism: Genres of Representation. New York: Social Science Research Council, 2010.
• Wüstenberg, Jenny, and Aline Sierp, eds. Agency in Transnational Memory Politics. New York; London: Berghahn, 2020. Catalogue

regular and active participation in the reading seminar 50 %
the seminar paper and its presentation 50 %

Jovana Mihajlović Trbovc is a political scientist dealing with political issues from perspective of culture studies. Her primary research field is the politics of the past and public memory of the crimes which happened during the dissolution of Yugoslavia and during the Second World War. She is especially focused on the impact of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) on the post-Yugoslav states, as well as the reproduction of the historical narratives in the school textbooks. Anothire line of her work deals with issues of gender equality in academia, position of women scientists from socialism until today and integrating gender dimension into research. She is a member of the Commission for Equal Opportunity in Science, a consultative expert body nominated by the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport of the Republic of Slovenia.