engleski

Osijek and Vukovar: Experience from the Margins

In this paper I will endorse the narrative approach and present four stories to explore their transformative mirroring power: one from Vukovar and three from Osijek. While the first depicts author`s visit of the Memorial centre of the Homeland War to which the Girardian theory of mimetic violence will be applied, the later three belong to the “new breed” (Appleby, 2000), the quiet grass-root peace activists that opted for breaking the circle ofviolence and war/conflict. The selected stories are part from the on-going research of the author, they are spatially framed (in Vukovar and Osijek) and time framed (1991- 1995). The paper has two aims: to point to the dominant narrative as a mode of stabilisation (leading to shared values, transmitting traditions, creating alliances) as well as exclusion (Dixon and Durrheim 2004) that can refuel hatred and revenge (Assmann, 2015) ; and to discuss the contribution of minority narratives to the creation of scapegoat-free social and spiritual action. The paper will give an account of the city of Osijek during the Croatian Homeland War (1991-1997) with an aim to provide an understanding how this city, only 35 km away from Vukovar (the hero-victim city) became a war-time peace laboratory.

City, scapegoat, power, grass-root peace activism

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