Abstract
This paper examines the cinematographic reworking of memory spaces associated with power relations and structural injustice. The way in which space is represented and used as a medium that reflects power relations allows to question the space itself in cultural productions from Central-Eastern Europe when associated with Romani people (space and power relations, memory of slavery and discrimination, space and freedom, territoriality, space and its inhabitants, non-belonging, segregation, etc.). The paper focuses on motion pictures produced in the last decade in Romania, a prolific period due to the increasing interest for memory activism and to the multiplication of the cultural exploration of challenging topics. It aims to identify narrative, visual, and aesthetic expressions used as deterritorialization practices to stimulate relational remembrance and engagement with ongoing social inequality and structural injustice. Two short films – Alina Șerban’ s Bilet de iertare (Letter of forgiveness) and Adrian Silișteanu’s Scris/Nescris (Written/Unwritten) – and a western type film – Radu Jude’s Aferim!, winner of the Silver Bear for Best director at Berlinale in 2015, are analysed here.
Highlights
By adding substance to the memory regimes and by addressing issues related to discrimination, inequality and structural injustice, cultural productions can empower vulnerable individuals and communities
Using a decolonial stance defined as involving a “conscious choice of how to interpret reality and how to act upon it” (Tlostanova 19), this paper analyses several cinema productions addressing Roma histories and experiences in order to identify narrative, visual and aesthetic expressions of power relations, used as deterritorialization practices in order to stimulate relational remembrance and engagement with past and current social inequality and hermeneutical injustice
The three films analysed - Aferim! (Radu Jude, RO/B/CZ/F 2015), Written/Unwritten (Adrian Silișteanu, RO 2016), Letter of Forgiveness (Alina Șerban, 2020 RO) - address the topic of territoriality and the adjacent non-belonging state of existence resulting from the social exclusion and marginality associated with the 47
Summary
By adding substance to the memory regimes (social, cultural, collective) and by addressing issues related to discrimination, inequality and structural injustice, cultural productions can empower vulnerable individuals and communities. Using a decolonial stance defined as involving a “conscious choice of how to interpret reality and how to act upon it” (Tlostanova 19), this paper analyses several cinema productions addressing Roma histories and experiences in order to identify narrative, visual and aesthetic expressions of power relations, used as deterritorialization practices in order to stimulate relational remembrance and engagement with past and current social inequality and hermeneutical injustice (see Fricker). By conceptually connecting territoriality and structural injustice, segregation and displacement, this paper aims to analyse and to highlight the cinema narratives and visual expressions that mediate the understanding of past inequalities and actively address ongoing discrimination. Șerban uses the interconnections between the physical world and the human expressions, to illustrate the structural inequality and discrimination that strangled and undermined the Romas' individual agency and the Roma community’s development
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