Thank you all for the posts and comments on this blog so far. I hope more of the participants will join in soon and help make this a lively and interesting blog.
We've had various examples of sites of memory in Denmark presented, and I thought that I would bring attention to another special place that evokes many different kinds of memories. I'm thinking about the music and arts festival 'Roskilde Festival' held each year in Denmark.
Some of you probably know the festival, either through the media or by participating yourselves. I myself have enjoyed the festival eight years in a row (2000-2007) as a very 'authentic' and muddy participant.
What interests me about the festival in relation to collective/cultural memory is the unique festival experience that gradually has evovled since the first festival was introduced in 1971. Lene presented the Viking week at Moesgaard as a special case of authentic 'living' history. I agree with her that the whole spectacle surrounding the Viking week aims at a remarkably more authentic experience of past times than in Den Gamle By, simply because of the unavoidable physical stimuli, such as taste and smell. But I still doubt that either smell or taste can evoke a past that goes beyond personal experience, as the argument for the Viking week goes, and for this reason I started thinking about my own experiences at Roskilde Festival.
One of the main issues when comparing the Viking week with the Roskilde Festival is the problem of continuity. It is obvious that the Viking week isn't a continuation of traditions performed in the age of Vikings. It is rather a re-invention of a way of life, based on various historical facts or assumptions. Roskilde Festival on the other hand represents an unbroken chain of events. The Festival held each year is a continuation of the tradition of festivals started in 1971, but that doesn't mean that the festival doesn't evovle - in fact the festival held nowadays hardly resembles the original festival. But is the festival then even a site of memory at all? Yes, but in a different sense than with the Viking week.
Firstly there are already various traditions being re-enacted each year at the festival. Many traditions concern the actual progression of the festival and rely heavily on intense planning from the festivals management - this includes the schedule for the concerts, the look of the camping area and other logistical issues. This has to do with the framing of the festival and surely affects the experience of going to the same festival each year. But this isn't all. More or less meaningful traditions are created spontaniously each year because of the participants. One of the funnier traditions is the naked-run which has been a big attraction since the first run in 1998. Another, more serious, section of the festival refers to the terrible accident in 2000. This has led to the construction of a memorial grove next to the orange stage thereby suggesting that the festival comprise both life and death.
In general the festival presents itself as a parallel community and it would be hopeless to count up all the instances were certain events refer to past incidents in the history of the festival. I think as a whole the festival is a strange complex of memorial constructs that somehow seem to be actively sustained by both the participant(s) and the management.
In returning to the discussion on authenticity I think that Roskilde Festival also challenges Svend Eriks point about 'tourists not being able to stand the smell of old times.' How does that argument work when tested on the case of Roskilde? Most people who go to Roskilde think that the smell is part of the authenticity of the event and in this case the durational matter is not a problem, since the festival always lasts a week. Here we must encounter the problem of continuity once again. Maybe the festival suggests an authentic experience, but is the historical span of the festival large enough to serve as a site of memory? As a collective memory ('Communicative' in Assmanns terms) yes, but as cultural memory, probably not. But what do you think? Let me hear your opinions on this.
Oh, you got me there, Jacob. I must belong to the tourist species. Authentic or not, the mud and the smell does not cling to my memorial system. But, your are right: experiences that releases memories are not in themselves just good or just bad, and we remember the good ones and forget the others. Mud is not traumatic in the deep sensse we have discussed, of course not. But the authenticity of a memoriý has, I guess to with the fact that is a memory of past presence, also when it does refer directly to the details of that past. I think that was the point in Kertesz about Auschwitz: we do not need to have memories of the precise location or the layout of latrins etc., but certain experiences, like a film comedy, may release memories of our past presence in a certain situation. And the what kind of experience it takes to release that memory of a past presence may evolve through history and may be referntially flawed, like the historifal novels of romanticism. Thye were shere fictitous contructions (invented traditions), but had the cultural function of keeping a memory alive of a past people could identiy with as their past. -Thanks for your valuable reflexions.
ReplyDeletePS: my kids went to Ringe!
Actually, I don't see why the Roskilde Festival is not a cultural memory? Certainly noy one of danish culture, but then maybe of western music culture. We've just gotten ourselves used to speaking of cultural memory as memories of a shared past. But there's more to being danish, european or world-citizen than just the past that created us. I would say that today a part of being not jut danish, but danish of a certain age and in a more globalized Denmark is going to Roskilde, Ringe or another music festival - really rich words for someone who never went... But maybe thatøs how I know - because i can't understand what everyone is talking about during summer, when they share their festival memories.
ReplyDeleteWell, I might not be the right person to ask, since I've never been to Roskilde Festival.
ReplyDeleteIf you look at the website, you find a page about the fundamental values of the festival. It says that Roskilde Festival is a boundary pushing international cultural-political manifestation, which is made possible every year thanks to thousands of volunteers. The Festival focuses on quality, creativity and safety.
The festival has certainly changed over the years. It has grown bigger, and it has become more international. Of course, after the terrible accident at the Orange Stage in 2000, the safety measures have increased.
Pushing boundaries, however, is also very important. As Jacob mentioned, the festival is a parallel community It is inscribed in a larger tradition of 'alternative' enclaves in Denmark (Christiana, the free state, is an obvious example). This is where you discover the long lost authenticity, where people meet and come together without boundaries – and roll around in the mud.
I am not sure what kind of memory it is. The communicative memory, as described by Assmann, is living, embodied, and non-institutional memory, so that might apply.
I will just mention two relevant theoretical terms, introduced by the German sociologist Ferdinand Tönnies in 1887: "Gemeinschaft" and "Gesellschaft". Gemeinschaft means community, and Gesellschaft signifies society as well as a company. Gesellschaft means business and division of labor, whereas Gemeinschaft can be based on a shared place or a shared belief. What Tönnies had in mind, was primarily the family and the religious community. Their influence is on the wane, however, so if we transfer it to contemporary life, you might say that Roskilde Festival is a kind of, or an attempt at, a Gemeinschaft.