From colonizer to victim: The memory culture of the War in the Pacific through the Burma-Siam Pakan Baroe Railroad Monument
Abstract
In this article I will demonstrate how the Burma-Siam Pakan Baroe Railroad Monument embodies the development of the memory culture about the war in the Pacific in the Netherlands. I will explain why this was contested war, and outline the ways in which it did gain a place in Dutch memory culture. Through a visual analysis I will also uncover who is being excluded from the monument’s commemoration and why.
References
Bal, M. (2008). Visual Analysis. In Tony Bennet and John Frow (Eds.), The SAGE Handbook of Cultural Analysis (163 – 184). London: SAGE Publications.
Bingen, E. (1999). Indië Verloren: Nederland en het Ontstaan van de Tweede Wereldoorlog in Azië. Amsterdam: Babel Boeken.
Captain, E. (2010) Inleiding. In Captain, E. & Jones, G. (Eds), Oorlogserfgoed Overzee: de Erfenis van de Tweede Wereldoorlog in Aruba, Curacao, Indonesië en Suriname (7-34). Amsterdam: Bert Bakker
.
Captain, Esther and Jones, Guno. (2010). De Tweede Wereldoorlog en de Verschoven Staatkundige Verhoudingen met de Oost en West. In Captain, E. & Jones, G. (Eds), Oorlogserfgoed Overzee: de Erfenis van de Tweede Wereldoorlog in Aruba, Curacao, Indonesië en Suriname (36 – 64). Amsterdam: Bert Bakker.
International Committee of the Red Cross. (1929, July). Convention Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War. Retrieved from: <https://ihldatabases.icrc.org/applic/ihl/ihl.nsf/Article.xsp?action=openDocument&documentId=8B2715471B7FB460C12563CD00518DB7>.
Hall, S. (1999). Whose Heritage? Third Text, Volume 13, Issue 49, 1999: 3 – 13.
Interviewee. Personal Interview, January 11th, 2018.
Kruidenier Betaalt de Rekening: Wereldreunie van Werkers aan de BirmaSpoorweg in het Kurhaus. (1967, February 2). Appeldoorn’s Dagblad.
Found in the archive of Museum Bronbeek: 2006/12/19-3-1 Plakboek 07074-1
Leeuwen, L, van. (2008). Ons Indisch Erfgoed: Zestig Jaar Strijd om Cultuur en Identiteit. Amsterdam: Bert Bakker.
Locher-Scholten, E. (2003). From Urn to Monument: Dutch Memories of World War II in
the Pacific, 1945-1995’ In Smith, A (Ed), Europe’s Invisible Migrants. (105 – 128). Amsterdam, Amsterdam University Press.
Melber, T. (2016, December). The Labour Recruitment of Local Inhabitants as Romusha in Japanese-Occupied Indonesia. International Review of Social History, Volume 26, Issue 24: 165 - 185.
Nationaal Comité 4 en 5 Mei (Accessed 2018, January). Arnhem, Birma-Siam en Pakan Boroe Spoorwegen Monument. Retrieved from: https://www.4en5mei.nl/herdenken-en-vieren/oorlogsmonumenten/monumenten_zoeken/oorlogsmonument/837/arnhem%2C-birma-siam-en-pakan-baroe-spoorwegen-monument
Nederland Erkent Indonesische Onafhankelijkheid per 17-8-’45. (2010, October). Trouw. Retrieved from: https://www.trouw.nl/home/-nederland-erkent-indonesische-onafhankelijkheid-per-17-8-45-~a92c233e/
Nora, P. (1989, Spring). Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Mémoire. Representations. No. 26, Special Issue: Memory and Counter Memory: 7 – 24.
Ooijen, I, van & Raaijmakers, I. (2012, September – November). Competative or Multidirectional Memory? The Interaction Between Postwar and Postcolonial Memory in the Netherlands.’ Journal of Genocide Research. Volume 14, Issue 3-4: 463 - 483.
Oostindie, G. (2011). Postcolonial Netherlands: Sixty-five Years of Forgetting, Commemorating, Silencing. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.
Ravensbergen, N. (2015, October). Het Landgoed Bronbeek: Gids voor een Wandeling Langs Gebouwen, Monumenten, Beelden en Bomen. The Hague: Ministery of Defence.
Rothberg, M. (2009). Multidirectional Memory: Remembering the Holocaust in the Age of Decolonization. Standford: Stanford University Press.
Sato, S. (2008, March). ‘Forced Labour Mobilization in Java during the Second World War.’ Slavery and Abolition, Volume 24, Issue 2: 97 – 110.
