Act of Remembrance as Acts of Resistance: Performances of Intergenerational Memory as Memorial

Inspired by my family’s history as Polish survivors of Soviet deportations during World War II, this dissertation investigates the multifaceted role of performance in transmitting and preserving memory across various affective mediums such as theatre, graphic novels, comics, museums, and memorial spaces. By examining how the burden of remembrance passes through intergenerational performances of memory at personal and communal levels, this research contributes to the interdisciplinary nature of performance studies and its intersection with applied theatre, critical museum studies, and memory studies—using an autoethnographic lens to explore specific frameworks of memory, including collective, prosthetic, postmemory, and what I am describing as (post)postmemory. This dissertation engages with the under-theorized diaspora, commonly referred to as ‘Sybiracy,’ whose exile to Siberia had been publicly unacknowledged until the fall of communism and still generally remains unknown. As a departure point for inquiry, this emphasis offers a broader reflection on how intergenerational performances of remembrance can be employed in the face of national and generational erasure. For the Sybiracy, familial and communal acts of remembrance remained a way to ensure their survival in forced labor camps was not forgotten. My research surveys familial performances of memory, how it impacts generations over time, and how it models a shift from the personal to the public sphere, providing insight into how descendants of historical trauma reckon with the future embodied archive, offering a profound insight into how audiences interact with past events through modes of performance.\nThe dissertation explores in detail the newly opened Muzeum Pamięci Sybiru (Sybir Memorial Museum) in Białystok, Poland, and its potential as a surrogate site of historical memory and remembrance for a diasporic community that, until now, lacked a specific place of memory. The research includes a discussion of the role objects and recovered personal belongings play in the performativity of the museum sites to inspire active visitor engagement. In a more contemporary turn, I examine the popular Broadway musical “Come From Away” as a performance site that facilitates audience co-witnessing. As a performance of narrative recollections, "Come From Away" constructs a frame for prosthetic memory engagement that complements the established national 9/11 narrative by including a Canadian experience. Lastly, this dissertation highlights the contribution of Art Spiegelman’s graphic narrative “Maus” to the foundational study of postmemory, inspiring third-generation author-illustrators such as Amy Kurzweil, whose visual narrative “Flying Couch: A Graphic Memoir” serves as a source of analysis, providing a unique perspective into the transmission of intergenerational trauma and remembrance. The research further highlights the role of gender, particularly the maternal line, in memory transmission, suggesting that these processes can contribute to forming familial and individual identities.\nIn analyzing these specific points of intervention, the research emphasizes the capacity of performance to extend beyond traditional performance spaces to facilitate the understanding of historical pasts and inspire ethical, action-oriented behaviors in response to past traumas. These constructs provide the lens for understanding how performance mediums promote the interchangeability, exchangeability, and commodification of memories, how memories are transmitted from survivors to their descendants, and how third-generation descendants engage with traumatic historical events, respectively. The dissertation concludes by suggesting that the use of memory theory as a framing device for performance in alternative settings can emphasize its potential to stimulate social resistance against forgetting and encourage dialogue about shared pasts.

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