Articles

Speaking the Self, Narratives on Srebrenica

Authors

  • Odile Heynders School of Humanities at Tilburg University, Tilburg

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5463/ejlw.3.43

Keywords:

Srebrenica, Life Narrative, Voice, Authenticity

Abstract

In this article, various life narratives documenting the fall of the Srebrenica enclave in July 1995 will be discussed and analyzed. The fundamental question underlying the reading of these narratives is ‘How do separate stories construct the memory of a European locus, offering an understanding of a geopolitical space as build on interchangeable voices’? The larger context within which this paper is written is my research on the symbolization of Europe: to get a grip on the European reality and culture we need to analyze and interpret narratives in the light of and with regard to the historical facts, their impact, and the collective and suppressed memories involved.

Author Biography

Odile Heynders, School of Humanities at Tilburg University, Tilburg

Odile Heynders is a Professor of Comparative Literature in the Department of Culture Studies at Tilburg University and was a fellow at NIA S (Netherlands Institute for the Advanced Study in the Humanities) in 1998/99, and 2004/05. She has published books (in Dutch) on modernist strategies of reading, European poetry, Dutch public intellectual Paul Rodenko, and the history of literature studies in the Netherlands. Her current research project is on writers as European public intellectuals and celebrities. Heynders is Head of the Research Programme: Literature and Visual Art in the European Public Sphere and supervisor, together with sociolinguist Jan Blommaert, of the junior research team (PhD’s & Post docs) TRAPS: Transformations of the Public Sphere. She was member of the Core Staff of the Liberal Arts Bachelor at Tilburg University (2004–2010) and is the Coordinator of the Tilburg Honours Programme European Discourses.

Published

2014-01-17

Issue

Vol. 3 (2014): EJLW

Section

Articles

Copyright (c) 2014 Odile Heynders

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