Apologies for cross-posting
Call for papers for the edited volume:
Europeanisation and memory politics in the former
Yugoslavia
Ana Milošević (KU Leuven) and Heleen Touquet (Harvard,
KU Leuven)
Deadline for proposals: 15 June 2018
Notification of acceptance: 15 July 2018
Submission date: 15 December 2018
An
increasing number of studies from various disciplines have analysed the impact
of Europeanisation on collective memory of both EU member states and candidate
countries (Mälksoo 2009; Convey and Pattel, 2010; Radonić, 2012; Kucia,
2016; Kowalski and Törnquist-Plewa, 2017; Perchoc, 2018; Milošević,
2017, 2018).
They
have concluded that “ethical remembering” is at the core of the
EU’s politics of memory - the rejection of anti-Semitism, xenophobia and
racism, respect for human rights, freedoms and protection of minorities
(Milošević 2018; see Levy and Sznaider 2002; A. Assman 2006; Leggewie
2010; Wæhrens 2013). Common memory, and shared attitudes towards the past have
importantly also served as a source of self-legitimisation for the EU. They convey
broadly defined European values and undergird the idea of a common future
through fostering of a European identity (Littoz-Monnet, 2012; Gensburger and
Lavabre 2012; Calligaro, 2013; Sierp, 2014; Kaiser, 2015; Neumayer, 2017;
Milošević, 2018).
This
volume explores how the process of European integration has influenced
collective memory in the countries of the former Yugoslavia. Whether it is
coded as “reconciliation”, “good neighbourly relations”
or “cooperation with the ICTY,” dealing with the past is a formal-informal
condition for the EU membership (Touquet and Milošević, 2018).
However, in the region there is still no common understanding on the causes
(and consequences) of the Yugoslav wars (Ramet, 2005; Jović 2009). The
conflicts of the 1990s but also of the WWII and its aftermath have created
“ethnically confined” memory cultures (Kuljić 2002, 2006). As
such, divergent interpretations of history continue to trigger confrontations
between neighboring countries and hinder their EU perspective.
These
memory wars also have a European dimension in the sense that they have become a
tool to either support or oppose Europeanisation (Mink and Neumayer, 2013; see
Subotić, 2009; Dragović-Soso 2012; Pavlaković, 2012,
Milošević and Touquet, 2018). Politics of memory is used not only to
support nation and state building agendas, but to foster EU identity and
endorse so-called EU values. The tensions that derive from the past, however,
continue to persist even after achieving the strategic goal of entering the
European Union (Touquet and Milošević, 2018; Pavlaković and
Pauković, forthcoming).
The
contributors to the volume should assess how EU Integration affects memory
politics in the countries of the former Yugoslavia (Croatia, Slovenia,
Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia (including Vojvodina), Kosovo, Montenegro,
Macedonia). Which internal/external (f)actors facilitate or constrain the
change? How do (non-) state actors support or resist Europeanisation at
memorial sites, museums, commemorations and production of soft memorial laws.
What are the outcomes of Europeanisation through memory politics?
Topics of interest
include but are not limited to the following:
·
National and transnational remembrance of the Holocaust / Porrajmos
·
Ethical remembering:
Memory discourse, war, peace and human rights
·
Political uses of the post-communist memory laws (legal and symbolic regulation
of memory)
·
Official memories and counter-hegemonic memories (official remembrance and
grassroots memorialisation)
·
Violence, war and gender in memory and remembrance
Submission
instructions
Please
submit proposals for papers in the form of a 500-word abstract with a short
biography to [log in to unmask]
AND [log in to unmask] .
Selected authors will be invited to present their contributions at the MELA
(Memory Laws in European and Comparative Perspective) conference in 2019. More
details to follow soon.