Paper short abstract:

The paper investigates the South Slavic films focusing on the Roma and the way these narratives uncover systemic injustices affecting not only marginal groups but society in general. It further discusses how alternative viewpoints are established while simultaneously redefining aesthetic practices.

Paper long abstract:

The year 1967 marks a tide of political and societal upheavals in the former Yugoslavia, including a series of provocative films known as "the Black Wave." Petrović's I Even Met Happy Gypsies is among the most visible and in this paper it serves as a matrix for illustrating the pertinent questions concerning this minority group in South Slavic film. I aim to demonstrate that this thematic congruity in an array of otherwise dissimilar films is not accidental and that, taken hand in hand with the extraneous socio-political factors, it opens up spaces of signification that go well beyond the reach of individual films. As a theoretical framework I apply ideas by the French sociologist Edgar Morin, in particular his 1956 work The Cinema or the Imaginary Man where he argues that photograph and film, although mere reflections of the material world, nonetheless restore its presence while opening up a possibility for our own projections of meaning. Film cannot be disassociated from the material man claims Morin, and his theory is particularly suitable since the documentary/anthropological aspect is prominent in films concerning the Roma. The paper investigates how representation of this group is employed in cinematic terms as a mechanism for establishing alternative viewpoints while simultaneously redefining aesthetic practices. It further discusses the ways these narratives uncover systemic injustices and ideologies affecting not only marginal groups but society in general. Other directors discussed include Makavejev, Šijan, Kusturica, Paskaljević, Brešan and Tanović.

Paper short abstract:

My research focuses on the production and reception of documentaries of the deportation and murder of Roma during WWII by the Romanian state in order to analyze the relationship between cinematic narrations of the past, politics of recognition of minorities and film making as political intervention.

Paper long abstract:

During the last decade the first documentaries on the deportation and murder of Roma during WWII appeared in Romania. Films like "Lacrimi Romanes" (L. Cioaba, RO 2010) were made with the aim of collecting the memories of the last survivors of the Porajmos and in order to document the responsibility of Romanian authorities for the persecution of Jews and Roma. At the same time all these films have a political aim too. Because of the social and political marginalization of Roma communities, the support for the survivors to get financial compensation and above all political recognition in Romanian society is an additional mission for the film teams for example of "Hidden Sorrows" (M. Kelso, RO/US 2005) and "Valea Plangerii" (M. Leaha, RO 2013).

Against the backdrop of ongoing debates I will address the following questions in my talk:

Which narratives are presented in the documentaries?

Which institutions and associations collaborate in the process of production and presentation?

In which way do such films influence debates on the politics of history? Which other discourses accompany the production and the reception of these documentaries?

Interestingly enough - and to be kept in mind - is the fact that all the documentaries are more often shown outside Romania than in Romanian educational institutions or national television.

My paper will present first findings of ongoing research about the refiguration of national self-images in contemporary Romania. It focuses on the connection of film and memory in order to ask for the politics of recognition Roma pursue in order to gain recognition.

Paper short abstract:

The paper offers an analysis of different ethnic minorities in the Croatian fiction film after 1990. Since 1990 marks a break in the Croatian history, filmic representation of minorities plays a crucial role in the way new society transforms itself and deals with conflictual national heritage.

Paper long abstract:

The focus of the paper is an analysis of cultural stereotypes and different ethnic and sexual minorities in the Croatian fiction film after 1990. Since 1990 marks a crucial break in the history of Croatian cultural identity and ethnicities of former Yugoslavia, representation of minorities in the context of war and postwar setting plays a distinguished role in the way contemporary, new society transforms itself and deals with conflictual national heritage. Through filmic representation the new society also tries to articulate its own identity by negotiating diversified minority identities which it conceives primarily as a threat and something that cannot be incorporated in the new social order. But also, through exploring themes that were silenced before the year 2000, contemporary films give minorities a new voice and a strong visual path to recognition even beyond the stereotyped version of its previous portrayal.

In the period from 1990 various Croatian films deal with primarily ethnic/national minorities. Two trends are visible in that regard: ethnic minority (like the Serbian) in the war context that struggles for recognition (for example in the film Witnesses, 2003, by Vinko Brešan) or ethnic minorities of different kinds in the postwar context (for example an Asian child in the film Sorry for Kunf Fu, 2004, by Ognjen Sviličić). Of course, these two aspects often intertwine, like in the film Fine Dead Girls (2002) by Dalibor Matanić, where the lesbian couple is fighting for recognition in the context of postwar Zagreb saturated by intolerance and war traumas.

Paper short abstract:

In contrast to the national-conservative movement's xenophobic basic principle "God-Honour-Fatherland", the Polish LGBT movement supports, as an important player of the minority politics, with its visual representations and performative practices the fight for more diversity and tolerance in Poland.

Paper long abstract:

Since the collapse of communism in 1989 and the beginning of Poland's transformation, the issues of protest and contestation became ubiquitous in the Polish society. Various (new) social movements appeared in Poland in the 1990s and one of them is the Polish LGBT movement, a liberal social movement fighting for recognition, more diversity and tolerance in Poland. While supporting the minority politics, the activists reject a nationalist ultra-Catholic "Poland for Poles" ruled by priests and represented by the national-conservative movement, which aims to rise Polish youth in a patriotic spirit, characterized by homo- and xenophobia.

In order to achieve its goals, the Polish LGBT movement produces a wide range of visual forms of representation (e.g. photographs, posters, leaflets, mems, comics or street art) as well as related to them performative practices (e.g. demonstrations, festivals, marches, parades or happenings). By presenting a selection of examples, I would like to: outline which symbolic (counter-) narratives are characteristic for Poland and which (utopian) realities they offer; answer the question about their (trans-) national networks and their role in Poland's democratization and present what do they reveal about the socio-political structures and the conditio humana of the Polish post-communist society.

The presented paper is based on my doctoral thesis concerning cultural representations of Polish post-communist landscape of protest, characterized by a very strong socio-political dichotomy between left- and right-wing movements. Methodologically, it is based on a conjunction of discourse and ethnographic field analysis with participant observations including qualitaive interviews.