Cold Memories, Hot Memories: Constructing Memory Culture in Post-Communist Bulgaria

Session Submission Type: Panel

Brief Description

In the years of post-socialist transformation in Bulgaria, the changed social and political frameworks have led to the construction of a new culture of memory. The contributors in this panel aim to outline some significant features of this new culture of memory by borrowing the metaphors of hot and cold memory (Charles Maier). They mark topoi of memory that are considered important and are the subject of commemorations, while others that are relegated to the margins of public memory. The authors share an understanding that contemporary memory culture is dynamic, complex, and characterized by the interplay of memory and counter-memory, amnesia, and actualization of history. The papers present the results of actual studies on memory created by institutions - museums, schools, cultural centers (chitalista), and the revitalization of traditions as a form of cultural/collective memory.

Sub Unit

• Anthropology, Cultural Studies

Chair

• Dilyana P. Ivanova Zieske, The Field Museum

Papers

• Revitalizing Traditions, Ethno-Nostalgia and Ethno-Nationalism in Post-Socialist Bulgaria - Ana Luleva, Inst of Ethnology & Folklore Studies BAS (Bulgaria)

• Nationalism, Memory, and Their Political and Cultural Manifestations in Bulgaria - Yana Hashamova, Ohio State U

• The Exhibition 'Tales from the Trenches. The Bulgarian Trench Art': Models and Mechanisms of Memory - Desislava Tiholova, Rousse Regional Museum of History (Bulgaria)

Discussant

• Tanya Ivanova-Sullivan, UCLA

Session Manager

• Benedict Edward DeDominicis, Catholic U of Korea (South Korea)