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Returning Chernivtsi to the cultural map of Europe : The Meridian Czernowitz International Poetry Festival

Bernsand, Niklas LU (2018) In East European Politics and Societies (EEPS) 33(1). p.238-256
Abstract
Drawing on tropes, stories, and symbols emanating from lost layers of urban cultural diversity has been an important resource in post-socialist city branding in many cities in Eastern and Central Europe that saw significant ethno-demographic changes in connection with World War II. In Chernivtsi, this is usually framed by narratives emphasizing tolerance, cultural diversity, and Europeanness, notions that are prominent in myths about the city in German-speaking Central Europe. A common strategy here, found in municipal city branding and in commercial efforts to draw on the multiethnic past in restaurants and cafés, is to deemphasize difficult questions about what actually happened to the celebrated cultural diversity and soften or ignore... (More)
Drawing on tropes, stories, and symbols emanating from lost layers of urban cultural diversity has been an important resource in post-socialist city branding in many cities in Eastern and Central Europe that saw significant ethno-demographic changes in connection with World War II. In Chernivtsi, this is usually framed by narratives emphasizing tolerance, cultural diversity, and Europeanness, notions that are prominent in myths about the city in German-speaking Central Europe. A common strategy here, found in municipal city branding and in commercial efforts to draw on the multiethnic past in restaurants and cafés, is to deemphasize difficult questions about what actually happened to the celebrated cultural diversity and soften or ignore the temporal break. The article analyses how the International Poetry Festival Meridian Czernowitz, that has taken place in Chernivtsi since 2010, works with the city’s culturally diverse past and its literary dimensions, drawing on tropes from both local multiculturalist narratives and on the Bukowina-Mythos popularised by intellectuals from German-speaking countries. Although the festival is not a venue for working through traumas, locating events in symbolically charged places such as the Jewish cemetery and highlighting Holocaust themes in poetry readings opens up for difficult questions where the lost cultural diversity might become something more than only a resource. (Less)
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author
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Cultural Heritage, Memory Studies, Chernivtsi, festivals, Ukraine
in
East European Politics and Societies (EEPS)
volume
33
issue
1
pages
238 - 256
publisher
SAGE Publications
external identifiers
  • scopus:85058714039
ISSN
1533-8371
DOI
10.1177/0888325418780453
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
f23cae04-a43f-4169-90c5-0b79e3a88e07
date added to LUP
2018-05-09 12:10:08
date last changed
2022-04-25 07:19:57
@article{f23cae04-a43f-4169-90c5-0b79e3a88e07,
  abstract     = {{Drawing on tropes, stories, and symbols emanating from lost layers of urban cultural diversity has been an important resource in post-socialist city branding in many cities in Eastern and Central Europe that saw significant ethno-demographic changes in connection with World War II. In Chernivtsi, this is usually framed by narratives emphasizing tolerance, cultural diversity, and Europeanness, notions that are prominent in myths about the city in German-speaking Central Europe. A common strategy here, found in municipal city branding and in commercial efforts to draw on the multiethnic past in restaurants and cafés, is to deemphasize difficult questions about what actually happened to the celebrated cultural diversity and soften or ignore the temporal break. The article analyses how the International Poetry Festival Meridian Czernowitz, that has taken place in Chernivtsi since 2010, works with the city’s culturally diverse past and its literary dimensions, drawing on tropes from both local multiculturalist narratives and on the Bukowina-Mythos popularised by intellectuals from German-speaking countries. Although the festival is not a venue for working through traumas, locating events in symbolically charged places such as the Jewish cemetery and highlighting Holocaust themes in poetry readings opens up for difficult questions where the lost cultural diversity might become something more than only a resource.}},
  author       = {{Bernsand, Niklas}},
  issn         = {{1533-8371}},
  keywords     = {{Cultural Heritage; Memory Studies; Chernivtsi; festivals; Ukraine}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{11}},
  number       = {{1}},
  pages        = {{238--256}},
  publisher    = {{SAGE Publications}},
  series       = {{East European Politics and Societies (EEPS)}},
  title        = {{Returning Chernivtsi to the cultural map of Europe : The Meridian Czernowitz International Poetry Festival}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0888325418780453}},
  doi          = {{10.1177/0888325418780453}},
  volume       = {{33}},
  year         = {{2018}},
}