Anna Dmitrievna Derendyaeva,
Graduate Student, Altai State University, Barnaul, Russia, e-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
The Famine of the 1930s in the Kazak (Kazakh) ASSR: Influence of Modern Cinema on the Identity Construction
DOI: 10.31518/2618-9100-2022-1-12
The article investigates modern feature and documentary films, dedicated to one of the collective traumas of the 20th century, the Famine of the 1930s in the Kazak (Kazakh) ASSR. Analyzing the main plots and using comparative approach, the author identifies key markers of identity reflected in the films: 1) “love for the motherland, for historical roots”; 2) “natural conditions, climate”; 3) “image of an enemy”; 4) “image of a national hero”; 5) “collective feelings, behavior”; 6) “features of national culture”; 7) “sites of commemoration”. It is noted that the designated identifiers show the construction of ethnic (national) Kazakh, but not civil (multinational) identity, which is proclaimed by the political authorities of the Republic of Kazakhstan in the official discourse. At the same time, a characteristic feature of the films under study is the formation of a “friend-or-foe” binary opposition, which shows the desire to delegitimize the opponents’ narratives reflecting a different interpretation of this collective trauma, famine. Therefore, the comparative analysis allows to conclude that cinema is one of the tools of the identity politics and the memory politics in modern Kazakhstan, and at the same time it is an element of the symbolic space. In this connotation, the collective memory becomes a kind of an “assemblage point” of the historical past.
Publishing: 28/02/2022
The article has been received by the editor on 01.12.2021
How to cite: Derendyaeva A.D. The Famine of the 1930s in the Kazak (Kazakh) ASSR: Influence of Modern Cinema on the Identity Construction // Historical Courier, 2022, No. 1 (21), pp. 124–132. [Available online: http://istkurier.ru/data/2022/ISTKURIER-2022-1-12.pdf]
Links: Issue 1 2022
Keywords: historical memory; collective trauma; memory politics; famine of the 1930s; cinema of the Republic of Kazakhstan; the Republic of Kazakhstan