Week 11 Notes

Week 12: 3/29-4/2

Monday 3/29

  • After this week, students will be in charge of their final projects
    • Next Monday: individual meetings
    • Next Wednesday: rest day
  • Short writing in class: Describe one character from the film The Innocents. What do we know about their back story? What does their character tell us about a particular memory of WWII?
    • Mathilde – a French working class communist who goes to Poland to be a nurse for the Red Cross
    • Sister Maria – the main nun that Mathilde interacts with who eventually becomes close friends with Mathilde. Before she was a nun, she lived as a woman on the outside and was able to have sexual experiences.
    • Sister Zophia – young novice who commits s*icide after she realizes that her baby has been taken out into the woods to die
    • the Mother Supreme – the head nun, in an attempt to not bring dishonor to the convent, tries to get rid of the babies, but later regrets this action and refuses treatment for syphilis for self-punishment
    • Themes?
      • Catholic attitudes about the body
      • the nature of victimhood – the nuns, Samuel (the French doctor), etc.
      • the gendered experience of war
      • a European memory of the war – that vilifies the Soviet Union
  • Poland during WWII
    • competing sources of authority – Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union
      • split from the Pact of Nonaggression in 1939
      • After WWII- nationalist authority based in London, and communist authority on the ground
    • a story of complete devastation from WWII
      • ground zero of the Holocaust
      • elimination of Polish cultural figures in German occupied Poland- religious, political, military leaders
    • 1947-1989 – Polish People’s Republic
    • Conservative Poland today
      • has its ties to traditionalist political movements pre-Soviet era
  • Collin and    – Presentation on the Warsaw Ghetto Heroes Memorial and The Innocents
    • Memorial
      • built in 1948 by Nathan Rapoport
      • made to commemorate those who fought against Nazi occupation
      • article focuses on portrayal of various figures who were involved
        • Mordecai Anielewicz – the leader of the uprising
          • In real life, was a young boy, but in the statue is seen as a strong, muscular man
        • Women
          • in real life, participated in the resistance, but in the statue are seen as passive, motherly, or sexual
      • On the back side, there is a frieze dedicated to the Jews who were sent to Trablinka
        • compared to the sculpture on the other side, are seen as far more passive and less resisting
        • Nazi faces can barely be seen
        • does it characterize these people as “lambs to the slaughter” or a dignified people who held onto their culture
    • The Innocents 
      • Polish people went from Nazi oppression to Soviet oppression
      • mass r*pe was prevalent during WWII by Soviet soldiers
      • film was based on true events – Madeline Pauliac worked for the French Red Cross (died February 1946).
    • Class thoughts on the monument
      • monument evokes a sense of empathy for the figures in the uprising
      • larger-than-life presence and wall structure makes it all the more striking
      • identifies a positive role model out of history – but fails to include the female role models of the Warsaw uprising
      • sexualization of women or historic representation of liberty?
      • what are the conditions under which this memorial was created?
      • do the individuals serve as realistic depictions of allegories?
      • what does the woman represent? the emotional struggle of the Jewish people?
      • what does the baby represent? the future?
      • memorial was a product of the immeadiate post-war need to reckon with Jewish suffering.
        • 10 or 20 years later, the story of the Jewish people would not be acknowledged by the Soviet Government
        • after the 1940s, could this monument have been created?
    • Class thoughts on The Innocents 
      • what does the ending mean?
      • could the film delivered the same message if it was directed by a man?
      • speaks to the experience of women and children during war
      • explores a recooperation of Europe
      • what is the message of the film in 2016?
        • the “liberation” was not so much a liberation
        • speaks to the forgotten memories of Polish women and children
        • brings up the origins of tense relationships between European countries
  • Coming up on Wednesday…
    • the Yugoslav wars and their contemporary memories

Monday 3/29

Announcements:

  • Sign up to meet with Professor Shaya on Monday
  • No class Wednesday!
  • Final project proposal (3-5 pp.) due next week

TA Presentation on Yugoslav Wars background – view presentations here

What does the Bridge over the Drina Mean?

  • represents the older history of Yugoslavia and the city of Visegrad – Ottoman Empire, etc.
  • symbol of new life as it was the bridge that babies would take into the city
  • represents killing of Bosnian Bosniaks by Bosnian Serb paramilitary forces
  • to the Bosnian Serbs- represents a ‘non-memory’ of their participation in the ethnic cleansing of Bosnian Bosniaks – silence and forgetting
  • UNESCO world heritage site – sought to bring healing
  • Women in Black  (Serbian womens’ organization) – represents the crimes of their own group

Turner – presentation on reading

  • 1990s Visegrad
    • 25,000 people, both Bosnain Serbs (66%) and Bosnian Bosniaks (33%)
    • mass killings, r*pes, torture
  • Mehmed Pasa Sokolovic Bridge
    • seen as a unifier between Islam and Christianity and between various ethnic groups
    • both Bosnian Bosniaks and Bosnian Serbs use the bridge to identify themselves and identify their stories during the Bosnian War
    • used to commemorate the suffering of Bosnian Bosnaiks and to celebrate Bosnian Serb perpetrators
    • locals today are reluctant to speak about the war and those involved
    • Today, the Bosnian bridge is taboo to speak about yet it shapes the modern ethnic identities of both groups today
  • Questions to consider:
    • Which is the more valuable method of public remembrance– monuments built in reaction to events, or preexisting structures that hold symbolic and historical memory?
    • How can the memory of events after war change over time?
    • Can two differing collective memories of war coexist?
    • What are some key backlashes or advantages that come with it?

Peter’s Presentation on War is a Force that Gives us Meaning by Chris Hedges

  • Chris Hedges is a war correspondent and Professor of History and Philosophy
  • Shares his experience of covering the Bosnian War in Sarajevo
  • Argues that war was created by nationalist myths told to the public.
  • Most important chapter: “The Hijacking and Recovery” that focuses on the recovery of memory after the conflict
    • tracking down perpetrators, providing justice, exhumations of victims
    • emphasizes the importance in acknowledging both victims and blame
  • Would truth and reconciliation committees work in former Yugoslavia?