Trauma and silence: strategies of mediation in the aftermath of civil war

Abstract

The article argues that there are limitations in relying solely on witness testimony and archival material to document the continuing effects of civil war. It references Daniels' 41-minute film, Not Reconciled (2009), which concerns Belchite, a medieval town in the Aragon region of Northern Spain, and the three-week battle that took place there in 1937. The article explores the ways in which the utilization of fictionalized characters, the voices of ghosts of Republican and Nationalist fighters, can enhance the realist strategy of observational footage and testimony, and demonstrate witnesses' evasiveness and resistance to remembering. While the ruins of Belchite are silent, the voices of ghosts provide a sense of the simultaneity of past, present and future.

Keywords::

• Spanish Civil War
• experimental documentary
• trauma
• memory

Notes

^1. Because of this, in the old town of Belchite, there is no continuation of past in the present social relations. Its living social identity ended when the last inhabitant left in 1954. The ruined town has no identifiable significance in the social fabric of the population in the new town adjacent to the ruins. At the two open entrances to the ruins, there are no official descriptions of the town or its history, no description of the three-week battle that took place there. The site remains open to the elements.

^2. In villages it was generally known where bodies were buried but it was illegal to recover them. The Historical Memory Law (http://leymemoria.mjusticia.gob.es/cs/Satellite/LeyMemoria/es/inicio) includes clauses relating to compensation payments and pensions for relatives of victims of the civil war and Francoist repression. Additional clauses also oblige towns to remove plaques, symbols and memorials commemorating the war from public buildings and streets. This, however, is still ignored. In Lecera, a village near Belchite, a street that runs through the centre of the village is still called Calle Franco. In the new town of Belchite, a street is called LosHeroes de Belchite, referencing the nationalist victors.

^3. Preston catalogues in detail the victims of violence on all sides in the civil war, in The Spanish Holocaust (2012, 207–208): ‘For all families, the death of a loved one without proper burial and ritual was traumatic. To be able to visit a grave, leave flowers or meditate permits some reconciliation with the fact of loss. This was denied to almost all the families of those killed in the repression […] for the families of all the victims […] mourning and the support of their community were replaced by insult, humiliation, threats and economic hardship’.

^4.Not Reconciled can be seen online at http://vimeo.com/28050084.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jill Daniels

Jill Daniels teaches film theory and practice at the University of East London. She is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and has been making films since 1989. Her most recent film The Border Crossing (2011) explores memory, trauma and identity in the experimental autobiographical documentary and is set in the Basque country. She has recently co-edited the book, Truth, Dare or Promise: Art and Documentary Revisited (2013) published by Cambridge Scholars. Her forthcoming autobiographical documentary film, The Circle, explores long-held secrets in her Jewish family. Her website is http://www.jilldanielsfilms.com