Subotić , Jelena Yellow Star, Red Star: Holocaust Remembrance after Communism (review)

Abstract

REVIEWS 187 Subotić, Jelena. Yellow Star, Red Star: Holocaust Remembrance after Communism. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY and London, 2019. xx + 241 pp. Maps. Illustrations. Notes. Index. £24.99: $29.99. Seventy-five years since the liberation of Auschwitz, Holocaust memory still remains the topic of fervent debate in Eastern European and post-Communist historiography. In Yellow Star, Red Star: Holocaust Remembrance after Communism, Jelena Subotić, professor of political science at Georgia State University, develops a framework for understanding how political memories shape the contemporary identities of ‘ontologically insecure’ states. By focusing on Serbia, Croatia and Lithuania as primary case studies, Subotić also illuminates the history of the Holocaust and its remembrance in states which have remained largely marginal in Holocaust studies. The author contends that post-Communist states are of particular interest because they are dealing with multiple sources of ontological insecurity: insecurities about their European and national identities, their status in the international community and their newly independent states’ relationships with international organizations. One of the strategies to overcome these insecurities is what Subotić has termed Holocaust ‘memory appropriation’, which entails using the Holocaust ‘to memorialize a different kind of suffering, such as suffering under communism, or suffering from ethnic violence perpetrated by other groups’ (p. 9). This is dangerous because it not only erases the suffering and banalizes the genocide of Europe’s Jewish population, but it also asserts a false equivalency between fascism and communism. In the first chapter of the book, Subotić outlines the importance of Holocaust memory to European and liberal conceptualizations of modernity. In fact, the need for continuous reflection on dishonourable legacies such as the Holocaust is a constitutive element of Europeanness; it is a crucial element in the process of ascension of post-Communist states to the European political and moral community (Dace Dzenovska, School of Europeanness, Ithaca, NY 2018). In this chapter, the author argues that Serbia has adopted ‘memory inversion’, which is reminiscent of what Marko Živković has termed ‘the wish to be a Jew’ (‘The Wish to be a Jew: The Power of the Jewish Trope in the Yugoslav Conflict’, Cahiers de l’Urmis, 6, 2000, pp. 69–84); the worn-out national narrative which frames the Serbian nation as a righteous victim in the hopes of earning pity in the West. In this strategy of Holocaust memory appropriation, the discourse and imagery of the Holocaust is appropriated to illuminate Communist crimes against Serbs. Interestingly, Subotić accuses Croatia of ‘memory divergence’, where the blame for the triple genocide against the Serb, Jewish and Roma communities is laid entirely on German Nazis, thus absolving the local fascists. In the final move, the author argues that Lithuania has adopted ‘memory SEER, 99, 1, JANUARY 2021 188 conflation’, in which narratives on the Holocaust are combined and equated with Stalinism. However, there is overlap in the appropriation strategies used; for instance, all three seem to engage in memory divergence by blaming the Germans for atrocities committed by locals. The following three chapters each deal with one of the three case studies, aiming to compare the Soviet and Yugoslav Communist experiences, as well as the experiences of members and aspiring members of the European Union. The first section of each chapter outlines the timeline of the Holocaust in these states, particularly emphasizing local collaboration with the occupiers and participation in the genocide of the Jews. Subotić engages in critical discourse analysis and compares state remembrance rituals, speeches and memorials during the Communist and post-Communist periods. Subotić concludes each case study with a brief discussion on the contemporary lives of the devastated Jewish communities through interviews with community representatives and Shoah survivors. The final chapter of the book reiterates the fact that these state machinations with historical revisionism have resulted in the rehabilitation of local Holocaust architects and collaborators, contributing to the proliferation of neo-fascism and right-wing nationalism in Europe. Subotić closes her book with a memorable call for ‘memory solidarity’, arguing that ‘feeling and expressing accountability for all this violent history makes our histories more balanced and complete and our societies more just’ (p. 228). The impact of these revisionist remembrance practices on communities victimized by the Holocaust is...