The Destruction of a Symbol and the Identity Paradigm of a City in Transition

Abstract

The author's English summary from the article:

Key words: Urban identity, symbol, transitional literature.

As the place is not only a context or background but it is an integral part of the identity, we should mention the role of a symbol in social and cultural studies. A small architectural change may change, for instance, social interaction, which in its turn may change the meaning of place. Places facilitate or challenge personal and social identity, as the place is a geographical environment which has acquired significance through the interaction between the person and the environment (Speller et al., 2002). When studying the urban identity, we shall determine the main characteristics of place identity theory and define common features of the identity of a city in transition: What makes an urban identity?

Is it possible to determine common features of identities of cities in one period and different places, with similar political ideology? What is the identity of cities in transition? Does the destruction of a symbol determine the crisis in personal identity? Studies focused on the transformation of the urban model, describe three types of urban transformation: transformation taking place in one and the same period, but in different places (cultural influence etc.); transformation taking place in different times but in one and the same place; and transformation in different time and place (Renfrew 2009:49). This study deals with the first model, when in one and the same period of time, identity markers formed under the influence of dictate and forced ideology, were common for countries with different cultures and history, namely, for the Soviet Union and the Eastern European Countries.

Among these countries, Berlin is of interest which was divided by the wall and two countries with one cultural identity were formed: democratic and totalitarian. Through the analysis of literary texts, the study attempts to determine identity characteristics of a city in transition based on the examples of the capital of Western Germany, Berlin, and Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, one of the member countries of the USSR. The study uses characteristics described by place-identity and city-identity researchers; basically, it employs the studies of Kevin Lynch and Edward Relph, sharing views of researchers on certain features of city-identity markers and determinants.

Literature produced after the establishment of socialism in East Germany, was subject to strict censorship and control from the Communist nomenclature. Accordingly, after the fall of the Berlin Wall (Mauerfall) and German reunification (Einheit), the turnaround literature began to reveal history which had been accumulated and hidden for decades. The term turnaround literature, denoting a literary process, began to be established, encompassing all areas of public life in the German unification process and all three genres of literature. The political processes taking place in East Germany in the 90s of the 20th century were not alien to the countries of the Soviet Union, including Georgia.

Anti-Soviet protests developed into insurgency and demonstrations in the Georgian capital, Tbilisi, on April 9, 1989, ended in bloodshed. Thus, the processes taking place in the capitals of Georgia and East Germany, in Berlin and Tbilisi, as well as in other post-Soviet cities, have moved from one political space to another, new reality. Despite its independence, the process has evolved dramatically, both politically and historically. The political change, the end of the Soviet narrative, led to the disintegration of the social model that had existed for many years, that was no less traumatic for post-Soviet people. A model of social was constructed in them and around them in which people had to live and give birth to a new person in a politically transformed space.

Soviet people, disoriented and alienated to new environmental signs, were trying to survive in the new time. Consequently, it is not surprising that the overcoming of collective identity and the search for a new identity became the main concern for the human being, while in literature it reflected as the dominant trend. The turnaround started with the fall of the symbol in the Soviet Union and escalated into insurgency and demonstrations, as the destruction of the symbol each Soviet citizen had to destroy connection to their former identity and begin a struggle for liberation from a new, totalitarian state. The immanent function of the Soviet symbol was deeply rooted in the consciousness of the Soviet man, as the symbol was of particular importance in imperialist countries.

Physical and social environment, saturated with Soviet symbols, was part of the daily life of Soviet people; they controlled their social being and governed their collective activity and collective consciousness as well, which automatically contradicted their opposition with the representation of individualism. For some of the citizens, the area of ​action in the Soviet space is locked, and their attempt to bring down these firmly built borders. Others are used to the model of Soviet citizenship; They do not recognize the existence within a different system. However, the harshness of totalitarian rule reaches the social realm of each of them and determines their values and the “Self”.

The study discusses the meaning and conceptualization of a symbol based on dialogic relation of symbol and its immanent content and role in the process of conscious formation. Throughout the centuries, the symbol formed along with the change of times was represented in a range of connotations. Therefore, unsurprisingly, since ancient times, beginnings with thoughts of Plato and Aristotle, scholars have discussed the role of a symbol for the interpretation of different thinking models.

Published in the journal Sjani, vol. 20/2 (2019), pp. 246–261. Open the paper