War remembrance in a sacralized space of memory
The origins and evolution of Volkstrauertag in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12905282 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Jason F Kovacs (0000-0002-4244-908X, University of Toronto, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2015 |
| Volume | 9 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 218-234 |
| Publication date | 2015-08-25 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Memory Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1750-6980 • E-ISSN: 1750-6999 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/1750698015601181 |
| OpenAlex | W2336523008 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 30 |
In 1970, the remains of 187 German prisoners-of-war who died in Canada during World Wars I and II were transferred from three dozen sites across the country to a central burial ground in Kitchener, Ontario. Since then, a remembrance event ( Volkstrauertag) has been organized each November by members of the local German-Canadian community at the German War Graves in Kitchener’s Woodland Cemetery. I address the initial controversy that surrounded the decision to establish a central war cemetery to German prisoners-of-war. I then explore the evolving narrative that underlies the local annual remembrance ceremony and reveal incidents where the German War Graves temporarily became a contested site of memory. I conclude by arguing that, in contrast to observations of the event in Germany, the formative tradition of commemorating all-victims-of-war rather than simply the German war dead has not only been maintained in Kitchener but has broadened in recent years
Ancient history · Archaeology · Art · Ceremony · Genealogy · German · Literature · Narrative · Spanish Civil War · World War II · History · Memory, Trauma, and Commemoration · Oral History, Memory, Narrative Analysis · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies
War Grave Pilgrimage
Memory, History, Forgetting
Germans as Victims?
War Graves Pilgrimage
On Collective Memory
Soil, Ashes, Commemoration
Lest we forget’
Reconciliation through Remembrance? War Memorials and the Victims of Vukovar
Monuments, mundanity and memory
Constructing landscapes of power
Constructing national identity in Canada's capital, 1900–2000
The Canadian Historical Review
Sacred Landscapes
National Cemeteries and National Revival
War Commemoration and the Republic in Crisis
A Monument's Work is Never Done
War Memorials as Political Memory
Between Memory and History
Performing the New German Past
The contours of memory in post-conflict societies
Collective remembering through the materiality and organization of war memorials
Memory, Commemoration and the Meaning of a Suburban War Memorial
Agamben at Ground Zero
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,22 |
| Citation span | 2017 - 2022 (6) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 2 |