Suchergebnisse

This article is motivated by the specific and largely dissatisfactory state of the application of modern conceptions of local and regional development in post-transformation countries of Central and Eastern Europe. The same holds true for cultural industries, which became a buzzword and a sign of socioeco-nomically more successful places and regions. The main objective of this paper is to examine selected issues related to the application of cultural industries in Central and Eastern Europe. Conceptions cha-racterizing cultural industries have been born in advanced countries in the West. Subsequently, their applications consider standard Western economic-institutional milieu that evolved naturally and in the longer run. Nonetheless, history matters and economic-institutional settings in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, for which numerous developmental discontinuities are symptomatic, are far from the Western ones. This raises many question marks on the applicability of cultural industries in specific and still-developing economic-institutional conditions in places and regions in Central and Eastern Eu-rope. The primary perspective adopted in this article is a theoretical one with a wide utilization of qua-litative approaches.

This book discusses the active relationship among the mechanics of memory, visual practices, and historical narratives. Reflection on memory and its ties with historical narratives cannot be separated from reflection on the visual and the image as its points of reference which function in time. This volume addresses precisely that temporal aspect of the image, without reducing it to a neutral trace of the past, a mnemotechnical support of memory. As a commemorative device, the image fixes, structures, and crystalizes memory, turning the view of the past into myth. It may, however, also stimulate, transform, and update memory, functioning as a matrix of interpretation and understanding the past. The book questions whether the functioning of the visual matrices of memory can be related to a particular historical and geographical scope, that is, to Central and Eastern Europe, and whether it is possible to find their origin and decide if they are just local and regional or perhaps also Western European and universal. It focuses on the artistic reflection on time and history, in the reconstructions of memory due to change of frontiers and political regimes, as well as endeavours to impose some specific political structure on territories which were complex and mixed in terms of national identity, religion and social composition. The volume is ideal for students and scholars of memory studies, history and visual studies.

"How did communities come to terms with the collapse of communism? In order to guide the wider narrative, many former communist countries constructed museums dedicated to chronicling their experiences. Museums of Communism explores the complicated intersection of history, commemoration, and victimization made evident in these museums constructed after 1991. While contributors from a diverse range of fields explore various museums and include nearly 90 photographs, a common denominator emerges: rather than focusing on artifacts and historical documents, these museums often privilege memories and stories. In doing so, the museums shift attention from experiences of guilt or collaboration to narratives of shared victimization under communist rule. As editor Stephen M. Norris demonstrates, these museums are often problematic at best and revisionist at worst. From occupation museums in the Baltic States to memorial museums in Ukraine, former secret police prisons in Romania, and nostalgic museums of everyday life in Russia, the sites considered offer new ways of understanding the challenges of separating memory and myth"--