Overview

The resistance by partisan women in Yugoslavia and Carinthia (Austria), and particularly their artistic production, have not been acknowledged in the historical accounts of World War II. Their art was both a form of resistance and a culturally subversive practice, ranging from avant-garde aesthetics to traditional forms of folk art and handicraft. The cultural production by and subsequently about the Yugoslav and Carinthian women partisans includes literature, visual arts, film, photography, comics, textiles, press, theater, dance, and monument architecture. The contributors to this volume present this groundbreaking research to mark eighty years since the victory over Nazism and Fascism in Europe.

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9783837677287

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Reviews

»A major scholarly contribution to the study of partisan art, this volume makes a forceful case that the historical success and the genuinely radical nature of the Yugoslav people's liberation struggle are inseparable from the cultural and social revolution carried out, under the impossible conditions of WWII, by a band of sisters and artists. It is essential reading for anyone interested in what it took to defeat fascism - and how it can be done again.«-- ""Djordje Popovic, University of California, Berkeley"" »The publication of this new collection comes at a time when a global assault on basic human rights has resurrected the ignominious legacies of fascism. Under such circumstances, a collection that provides new details about the autochthonous Yugoslav anti-fascist struggle is more relevant than ever. The broad selection of essays in this collection will be a valuable source in understanding why the Yugoslav anti-fascist struggle has become an important symbol to a growing number of youth protesters of today in their own fight for a society founded on justice.«-- ""Tatjana Aleksic, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor"" »Women and Partisan Art: Aesthetics and Practices of Resistance in Yugoslavia and Carinthia is an impressive volume that illuminates the role of women in antifascist struggle during WWII. In six thematic parts and with a diverse set of scholarly approaches, the contributors effectively convey the breadth of women's experiences evident in resistant partisan artistic practices during the war and beyond. Closer attention to such cultural production and its legacies is urgently necessary at a time that is seeing a growth of authoritarian right-wing rule around the globe.«-- ""Dijana Jelača, Brooklyn College, City University of New York"" »Equality between men and women is not a distant ideal which is to be realized through a longue-durée process of mentality change. Rather, it is the starting point and, at the same time, the very form of the struggle for emancipation. This was perfectly clear to the female partisans and their male comrades fighting fascism. Why have we forgotten it? Can we learn it again? Yes, we can! ‒ tells us this book and offers the first lesson: the cultural and artistic legacy of women fighting with the Yugoslav partisans.«-- ""Boris Buden, cultural theorist, Berlin""

Author Information

Elena Messner (Edited by) Elena Messner is an author, scholar, and a senior postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Slavic Studies at Universität Wien, with a project on feminist periodicals from ex-Yugoslavia. She is also a lecturer in Slavic literatures at the Department of Slavic Studies at Universität Klagenfurt. Her research interests include (post-)Yugoslav literature, art and periodicals, feminist theory, translation and reception theory as well as the cultural heritage of the Yugoslav resistance movement. Cristina Beretta (Edited by) Cristina Beretta is an associate professor of Slavic literatures at the Institute of Slavic Studies at Universität Klagenfurt. Her research interests include post-Yugoslav war literature with a focus on nationalism and agency, gender- and queer studies in Russian and in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian/Montenegrin literatures with a focus on gender norms, cross-border studies, and Alps-Adriatic studies. Goran Lazičic (Edited by) Goran Lazičic holds a PhD in Slavic studies and is a lecturer in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian literatures and cultures at Universität Graz and Universität Klagenfurt. His research interests include Yugoslav and post-Yugoslav literature and film, satire, comedy and subversion in literature and art, and nostalgia, paranoia, and conspiracy theories in post-socialist contexts. Markus Gönitzer (Edited by) Markus Gönitzer is a cultural worker and curator of public discussions of social policy and politics. Since 2021 he has been a member of the board and artistic directorate of Forum Stadtpark, a production and presentation space for contemporary art in Graz. He is chairman of Verein/Drustvo Persman, the association responsible for the pedagogical and scientific curation of the Persmanhof Museum. His main fields of work include culture(s) of remembrance, theories of utopia and transformation, as well as art and cultural initiatives as vehicles of social change.

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