by Matias Muuronen
How should we approach the usage of memory politics in film and entertainment?
Through a reading of Slavoj Žižek’s critique of the work of Emir Kusturica, I attempt to depict two approaches. They are based on Jeffrey Olick’s differentiation between collected memory and collective memory. While the former emphasizes subjective notions of remembering, the latter views culture as a collective repository of symbols. When compared, the two propose rather distinct models for understanding the role of historical representation.
Žižek criticizes Emir Kusturica’s ‘’depoliticized aestheticist attitude’’ as serving the western gaze[1] by making use of Todorova’s concept of balkanism, according to which Southeast Europe has been rendered as a violent dichotomy to the peaceful West.
The stage is set for presenting a passionate and emotional Southeastern Europe, which is exactly what the anemic West wants itself to be contrasted with.
Investigating Kusturica’s film Underground (1995), Žižek interprets Kusturica’s methods on the basis of the unconscious, arguing that Kusturica hides the political nature of his film into its aesthetic: the characters are presented in a static, timeless sphere, echoing the Western image of the Balkans. Kusturica gives the European audience what they want to see. The stage is set for presenting a passionate and emotional Southeastern Europe, which is exactly what the anemic West wants itself to be contrasted with.
According to this interpretation, one could situate the characters of Marko and Blacky and their disregard for the values of the resistance as a representation of weak morale – a stereotypical image of the West against the Balkans. Ideology serves no purpose: neither communist ideology nor resistance leads the people to misery. Moral degradation inherent in the region is the root cause of all evil. Žižek attempts to politicize Kusturica’s depoliticized imagery by highlighting the manner in which Kusturica presents the region as the Western gaze wants to see it.
It becomes worthwhile, I believe, to examine Žižek’s critique through Jeffrey Olick’s distinction between collected and collective memory.[2] Through his psychoanalytic perspective, Žižek’s conception of political symbols differs from Kusturica’s.
For Kusturica, remembering is collective, since he presents symbols as autonomous. According to Saussure’s differentiation, the universal categories (langue) directing Kusturica’s language are visible in the human moral degradation in any societal context. These themes are communicated (parole) through characters, which instrumentalize these conceptions through their aesthetic. Perhaps, for Kusturica balkanism as practiced by the West is an autonomous symbol, which he questions by allowing his characters to bathe in the West’s bedraggled collective memory.
On the other hand, I argue that Žižek views the film from the perspective of collected memory. Žižek sees symbols as authentic solely when they are represented as such. On the basis of Jacques Lacan’s vocabulary, I consider Žižek to face the film on the level of the real.[3] Kusturica’s approach deals with the symbolic.
For Žižek, balkanism symbolizes the creation of a depoliticized image of Southeastern Europe.
From Žižek’s view, Underground forms part of our living, kinetic experience through which the individual faces the past as material truths, not structures of thought. For Žižek, balkanism symbolizes the creation of a depoliticized image of Southeastern Europe. This depoliticization is based on the West’s interpretation of the region as a constant warfield resulting from moral degradation.[4] Through his depoliticized aesthetic Kusturica reinforces these conceptions, which influence the way in which the West sees the Balkans.
Matias Muuronen is a master’s degree student at the University of Helsinki
This blog is a part of a blog series written by the BAMSE Tartu intensive course students. The blog series analyses the impact of crises on the politics of history, challenges of democracy, biopolitics and energy security. This blog is belongs to the challenges of democracy part of the blog series. Read more about the blog series on Bamse News & Events website.
[1] Žižek, S. (1997) Multiculturalism, or, the cultural logic of multinational capitalism
[2] Olick, Jeffrey K. (2007) The Politics of Regret: On Collective Memory and Historical Responsibility page 27
[3] Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Jacques Lacan chapter 2.1.3
[4] Žižek S. (1997) page 38