The article analyses the “Iron Curtain” as a Czech site of memory.
The official communist narrative denied the Western term “Iron Curtain” and asserted the legalistic argumentation of “state borders protection” supported by nationalistic and ideological arguments. After the fall of the regime in 1989 and the opening of the state borders, the Western “Iron Curtain” paradigm was adopted by the democratizing Czech society whereas the communist narrative
became marginalised. It did not disappear, though, and both interpretations, the “Iron Curtain” as a central part of the new mainstream discourse and the “state border protection” as a peripheral part of post-communist memory, have remained alive side by side. and Článek zahrnuje poznámkový aparát pod čarou
The 1990s signified the beginning of Taiwan´s "era of localism". Local places in Taiwan and the idea of Taiwan as a place were to gain unprecedented status in both political narratives and social practice. These place-centered acts gradually converged into the state-led Integrated Community-Making Program, in operation since 1994. Amid the prevailing phenomena, the past of a place was frequently perceived as representing a utopia which was rapidly fading or had been already lost as the result of development. The heritage sites, as "sites of memory", have thus not only served as "memory tactics" in rebuilding the sense and identity of a place, but are also expected to mediate the construction of a better future in terms of locality production. This paper examines the substantial components of locality in Taiwan within three frame works: globalization, machizukuri and community-building, which comprise the significance of locality in Taiwan. It concludes with case studies, which examine the social practice of place-making through the development of controversial sites of memory. It attempts to reveal the dialectical relationship between state-propaganda and the local practice of community-building, as well as the dilemma generated from the uses and abuses of global/local discourse.