[ecrea] CFP: NECS 2016 Panel "Recollecting (hi)stories: post-communist cultural and memorial practices in Balkan film”‏‏‎

*CALL FOR PAPERS*

*Proposed Thematic Panel for European Network for Cinema and Media
Studies (NECS) 2016: "In/Between: Cultures of Connectivity" conference
(*http://necs.org <http://necs.org/>)

*“Recollecting (hi)stories: post-communist cultural and memorial
practices in Balkan film”*

Geopolitical reconfigurations during the 1990s, with the end of the Cold
War, the breakdown of the Soviet Union and the period of transitions
from one system into another have led to persisting questions of
identity and nationhood for the Balkan region. Considering that the
processes of memory consist of instances of both remembering and
forgetting, films can reconstruct a period in the history of a society
by bringing together accounts of collective memory, in a way that is
conducive to debates about the conditions of the present, rather than
remaining in a vacuum of the past.

Svetlana Boym and Maria Todorova investigate the post-communist Eastern
European societies’ renegotiation of their communist pasts in the wake
of the present situation in their work on post-socialist nostalgia.
Under these circumstances nostalgia, as a way of recovering time (Boym),
becomes a key process of memory and one which functions against what
Andreas Huyssen has termed as a culture which is ‘terminally ill with
amnesia’ (1995). According to Todorova post-communist nostalgia is
generated by ‘elements of disappointment, social exhaustion, economic
recategorization, generational fatigue, and quest for dignity, but also
an activist critique of the present using the past as a mirror and irony
alongside a purely consumerist aesthetics’ (2010, 7). Furthermore,
society modifies recollections according to its present needs,
representing ‘the past to itself in different ways’ (Maurice Halbwachs,
1994). Collective memory is necessary for the formation of collective
identity. Thus recherche rather than recuperation becomes the principle
mode of memory: the post-socialist identity is explored through multiple
media forms and cultural practices, from the personal sphere (sharing
images, text and music on social media sites) to collective and social
memory. In order to remember, our hopelessly forgetful modern societies
need ‘sites of memory’ (Pierre Nora), which can manifest themselves in
many ways, through images, songs, books and monuments.

This panel seeks to explore how the present national identities are
negotiated by revisiting the past through recollection of its traces in
contemporary films (fiction, documentary, animation, experimental), both
in a metaphorical and physical sense, and how in reading these media as
locus of memory we can understand the changes in the region as a
continuation rather than a historical rupture.

We invite proposals exploring the above topic in contemporary fiction,
documentary, experimental and/or animation films from the Balkan region.

If you are interested in proposing a paper for this panel, please send
150 word abstracts to Dr. Raluca Iacob ((raluca.s.iacob /at/ outlook.com)
<mailto:(raluca.s.iacob /at/ outlook.com)>) and Ana Grgic
((ag219 /at/ st-andrews.ac.uk) <mailto:(ag219 /at/ st-andrews.ac.uk)>) by 15th January
2016.

--
Ana Grgic Ph.D. Candidate
Film Studies
University of St Andrews
99 North Street
St Andrews
Fife KY16 9AD


---------------
ECREA-Mailing list
---------------
This mailing list is a free service offered by Nico Carpentier and ECREA.
--
To subscribe, post or unsubscribe, please visit
http://commlist.org/
--
To contact the mailing list manager:
Email: (nico.carpentier /at/ vub.ac.be)
URL: http://homepages.vub.ac.be/~ncarpent/
--
ECREA - European Communication Research and Education Association
Chauss�de Waterloo 1151, 1180 Uccle, Belgium
Email: (info /at/ ecrea.eu)
URL: http://www.ecrea.eu
---------------