The politics of representing the past: Symbolic spaces of positioning and irony

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Abstract

This chapter presents narratives and symbols as cultural tools that position their audience as agentic actors in political conflicts. Using examples from narratives in the context of the Basque country conflict as well as street art in the Egyptian revolution, we will discuss how these symbolic tools prescribe certain actions to be conducted according to certain political goals as well as trigger response actions from authority. Both graffiti and historical accounts remind us of what happened, what the current situation is, thus somehow pointing to what people should do in such a depicted scenario. The focus will be on the aesthetic dimension of those tools exemplified in satire, where the image or narrative encourage reflexivity by helping the audience take a distance from the topic and reflecting on it, and thus positioning them, ironically, as heroic.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationThe Cambridge Handbook of Sociocultural Psychology
EditorsA. Rosa, J. Valsiner
PublisherCambridge University Press
Publication date2018
Edition2
Pages443-457
Chapter24
ISBN (Print)978-1-107-15769-9, 978-1-316-61028-2
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2018
SeriesCambridge Handbooks in Psychology

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