'Why Remember? Memory and Forgetting in Times of War and Its Aftermath
'Border Poetics and Politics: 1989 and the Fall of the Wall'
Hotel Europe, Sarajevo, 9th - 10th July 2019
CONFERENCE PAPER: "The Empire of Fiction: Reframing Images of a Dictatorship"
In his book, In Praise of Forgetting: Historical Memory and Its Ironies, David Rieff questions whether the age-long “consensus that it is moral to remember, immoral to forget” still stands in our contemporary era. What should we remember, what should we forget, and why? Do we need to reconfigure the way that we think about memory and its potential impact on issues such as reconciliation and healing in the wake of war? Is memory impotent as a social, political, or aesthetic tool? Rieff’s questions appear more pertinent than ever as wars and conflicts continue to rage in many parts of the world with no end in sight.
These questions of memory (and forgetting) are intensely political and have far-reaching consequences. Yet, how do they reverberate in the context of post-war societies, post-conflict reconciliation, conflict prevention, questions of memory and past events? To what extent do we remember the past and how do we choose what to remember and why we remember? How could and should (consciously and unconsciously) memory processes shape the present and future? How might public institutions (such as museums and other heritage sites that support education/awareness) deal with the past? What is the difference between commemoration and memorialization? Where do they intersect and how might they impact the process of reconciliation and prevention? What are landscapes of memory?
ORGANIZING COMMITTEE Dr Stephenie Young (Salem State University), Ms Danielle Luman (Salem State University), Dr Mehnaz Afridi (Manhattan College), Dr Manca Bajec (independent researcher), Dr Paul Lowe (London College of Communication, University of Arts London), Mr Admir Jugo (Durham University)
The conference is part of the WARM Festival 2019
The Organizers would like to thank the following for their generous support: Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Salem State University Manhattan College London College of Communication, University of Arts London