Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Exploring My Family's History by Hana

I would like to explore my family’s history in more detail - it is a rich history of countless obstacles (quitting membership in the Communist Party, support of Charter 77 and subsequent emigration, forced collectivization of a family farm, etc.). There are many more things that, unfortunately, still remain a mystery to me or that I do not have a clear account of. Sadly enough, the coverage of historical development of the Czech nation after WWII is not given enough (if any) room in regular history classes (at least in my experience), which gives me another reason to inquire into the history of my own family and try to decipher the country’s development through my own lens. Through direct interaction (personal correspondence, Skype interviews, personal accounts), I would like to create an authentic mosaic of what life was like for people during the communist regime (I assume most of the accounts will cover the 60s, 70s and 80s). If I do receive enough valuable information, I would like to transform the ‘family facts’ into something more literary/artistic, such as a collection of monologues/dialogues that could be potentially performed in public.

1 comment:

  1. I think this is a great project, and I can't imagine it yielding less information than you need. Most likely more, since once people get talking about these things, it's hard to get them to stop. I'm really excited about constructing this as monologues and dialogues. We could have a performance!

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