Sajmiste, Jasenovac, and the social frames of remembering and forgetting

Abstract

The article discusses the reasons for the construction, in the 1960s, of memorial to the victims of the former camp in Jasenovac in Yugoslavia, although no such memorial was built at the Sajmiste site. How should we explain and understand this difference and what do these two sites stand for in Yugoslav discourses about the past? I will argue that the memorial project for Jasenovac was, due to certain developments, seen as a substitute for similar plans at nearly all the former camp locations in Yugoslavia. Because of this substitution, after the mid 1960s none of the other concentration camp sites in the country benefited from federal financing and thus all of them were excluded from having a real chance at being made into a proper memorial site.Tekst razmatra razloge za izgradnju spomen-podrucja posvecenog zrtvama logora Jasenovac u Jugoslaviji tokom sezdesetih godina XX veka, iako takav spomenik nije podignut na mestu logora na Sajmistu. Kako da objasnimo i razumemo tu razliku i koje je mesto ta dva logora u jugoslovenskim diskursima o proslosti? Tvrdim da je, zahvaljujuci odredjenim kretanjima, projekat za Jasenovac bio sagledavan kao zamena za slicne planove za bezmalo sva mesta gde su se nalazili logori u Jugoslaviji. Zbog te zamene, nakon sredine sezdesetih godina XX veka nijedno podrucje gde su se nalazili koncentracioni logori u zemlji nije dobilo saveznu finansijsku potporu, pa je svima njima uskracena mogucnost da budu pretvorena u odgovarajuce mesto secanja.