The study deals with the content and transmission of “images” connected with forced displacement and the relating processes in two three-generation families. The families were chosen based on the oldest generation´s personal experience with the forced displacement after World War II (a family of “deported” Germans living in Germany today and a family of German origin remaining in Czechoslovakia after 1945). The analysis focusses on family memory, whereby the authors ask not only about the content of memories of persons who are part of the “generation of experience”, but also about the transmission of these contents down to the generation of children and grandchildren, as well as about in which way the follow-up generations came to terms with the experience of the oldest generation. The authors point out the importance of family memory to create the identity of persons participating in that memory, and they demonstrate one of possible types of family remembering, whereby the youngest and the oldest generation are its major participants (transgenerational remembering).
The article focuses on the problem of „štatl“ of Brno and its inhabitants, the so called „štatlaři“. The term „štatl“ can signify the city of Brno itself, or the city center, but also a certain type of subculture and, in connection with the term „štatlaři“, the specific group of the inhabitants of Brno. The core of the article consists in the analysis of images and meanings connected with štatl and štatlaři, their image and interpretation in memories and the exploitation of their image at present (commercial use in advertising). Besides štatl, the article also reflects the specific language, the so called “hantec” that is inseparably connected with štatl. The chronological frame of the article is from the 1960s to the present, but it mentions also the so called “Brno stove” (plotna) from the beginning of the twentieth century that is often mentioned in connection with štatl. The methodological basis of research consisted in especial in oral history and analysis of documents. The basic sources for the article were interviews, memoirs and published scientific articles. The results of the analysis should serve on the one hand as contemporary interpretation of life of certain group of people in urban setting during the period of socialism, on the other hand for better understanding of the processes that are connected to the contemporary creation of local identities, as well as commercial use of cultural artifacts.