EXERCIȚIUL MEMORIEI ŞI RENEGOCIEREA IDENTITĂŢII POSTDEPORTARE LA ROMÂNII BASARABENI
MEMORY PRACTICE AND RENEGOTIATING A POSTDEPORTATION IDENTITY IN THE CASE OF BESSARABIAN/MOLDAVIAN ROMANIANS

Summary/Abstract: In regard to the dynamics of social identity, each individual continuously receives wide, various and valuable information from his reference groups, and simultaneously promotes his/her image in all available media in order to obtain a feedback (how the others see him/her) which will, in the end, inform oneʼs own identity (how he/she sees him/herself). In the case of many formerpolitical deportees from the Moldovan Republic, their reintegration has been submit to a clause of social lack of credibility, due to the extreme character of their experience in the GULAG. The very hardships and adversity endured by the deportees have made it difficult for their more fortunate fellow citizens to believe that the horrible events had actually taken place. In order to heal itself, the social body would pretend not having known about its own misconduct, or having forgotten all about it. But the need for a true identity is strong in some individuals, therefore former persecuted keep fighting for their right to be now known and recognized for what they trully are: victims of the Soviet totalitarian system, and at the same time survivors and winners of decade-long individual, family or community battles against the same system. Their fight includes the ones who died along the strenuous journey. A group identity emerges: that of the former deportees, previously a muted category, now able to speak in a manner that compells the society to listen to their life stories. In respect of those reports, we try to analyse the various facets of the interaction between the former deportees and the Moldovan/Bessarabian society in which they still struggle to be reintegrated

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