The Memory of Nations provides a common place for storing and publishing recordings of witness interviews. Each year, we publish scores of interviews with witnesses from abroad as well. A large contributor to this success is our Slovak sister organization, Post Bellum SK.
CONTENTS OF THE MEMORY OF NATIONS COLLECTION
- 34 documentary projects in collaboration with foreign partners
- 700 documented witnesses
- 14 participating countries (Armenia, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Georgia, Croatia, Cuba, Lithuania, Hungary, Germany, Poland, Romania, the Russian Federation, Slovakia, Ukraine)
In 2017 we implemented the following projects in cooperation with our foreign partners:
STORIES OF THE 20TH CENTURY: FORCED LABOUR DURING NATIONAL SOCIALISM This project is focused on the experience of witnesses assigned to forced labour under the rule of National Socialism in Germany. The project includes interviews with witnesses of forced labour, the publication of a comic book based on their stories, a Czech-German workshop for secondary-school students, new sties in the Memory of Nations Sites app, and a trip to Dresden where students can explore specific locations connected with the witnesses’ stories.
MEMORY OF THE CUBAN NATION – AN INSTRUMENT FOR THE TRANSITION OF CUBAN SOCIETY INTO ONE OF TRUE LIBERTY In 2017 Post Bellum and Florida International University launched a collaborative project called Memory of the Cuban Nation to honour Cuban dissidents and activists. The project included the recording of 20 life stories of Cuban activists and dissidents and the training of Cuban documentarians.
IN THE BORDERLINE FOOTSTEPS OF CZECHOSLOVAK AND POLISH DISSIDENTS In 2017 we created to Czech-Polish exhibitions on Borůvková Mountain and in Malá Úpa, places where Czechoslovak and Polish dissidents used to meet in the 1970s and 80s for “outings of Czechoslovak and Polish friendship”. The project led to the creation of new audio recordings of Czech and Polish dissidents who participated in these meetings. The exhibitions will also be accompanied with virtual cross-border trails.
THE 20TH CENTURY IN THE MEMORIES OF THE CZECH MINORITY IN SERBIA We managed to capture a sense of the Czech identity throughout the many historical events that transformed the Balkans. We also recorded the development of the Czech minority in the 20th century and the social and political situation in Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia, which had a significant impact on the minority.
WE ARE NOT ALONE: THE STORIES OF OUR MINORITIES In an effort to increase awareness of the minorities that live in the Czech Republic, we documented 15 members of ethnic minorities. The recorded interviews gave rise to the eponymous travelling photography exhibition. We continued to record their stories in 2017.
ROMANI MEMORY: THE MEMORIES OF ROMANIES IN A CENTRAL EUROPEAN PERSPECTIVE This joint Czech-Slovak-Polish-Hungarian initiative supported by the International Visegrad Fund aimed to record at least 30 life stories of Romanies who were socially and culturally active under Communism during 2016 and 2017.
LIST OF OUR INTERNATIONAL PROJECTS:
Training of the documentarists from Burma in 2018
Memory of Cuban Nation II. 2018
Stories of the 20th Century: Forced Labor in National Socialism
Twentieth Century in Memories of Czech Minority in Serbia
Romani Memory: Recollections of Roma from the Central European perspective
Wandering in the Cross-border Footprints of Czechoslovak and Polish dissidents
