The Phenomenon of the “Secondary Witnessing”: Between the Indifference and the “Denial from Distrustfulness”

Article

Abstract

[In Russian]

 The paper is devoted to the phenomenon of «secondary
witnessing» and its peculiarities in contemporary Russia.
«Secondary witnessing» is understood here in a twofold sense:
as the contemporary responses to eye-witness testimonies and as
bearing witnesses to those episodes of common traumatic history
that cannot be directly experienced but retain their importance.
The author asks what happens to memory when it undergoes
numerous distortions and transformations as it gets passed from one
generation to another. The article develops a theoretical framework
of indirect memory of traumatic events and its embodiment in artistic
representations. Using a few examples taken from the Internet
and Russian conceptual art, the author discusses the impact the
Internet has on transmittance of memory and redemptive potential
of witnessing.