A Memory of Concrete: Politics of Representation and Silence in the Agostinho Neto Memorial

Abstract

Focusing on the Memorial António Agostinho Neto (MAAN) in Angola as the case study to analyse materialisations of memory, the article attempts to read the political representations of this monument by analysing its main narratives, questioning its silences and unpacking its impact on public memory. To do so, the article is divided into three parts. The first section engages with the relevant academic literature on southern African memorialisation and provides a brief description of the MAAN. The second and third sections consider Richard Werbner's notion of elite memorialism to produce a two-dimensional analysis, referencing the absence of MPLA narrative and symbols in the MAAN while noting how it became inaccessible to the ordinary Angolan population, a result of more ample dynamics of state society relations in the country. It concludes that the logics of social hierarchy that have promoted the marginalisation of segments of the population have impacted the MAAN's ability to contribute to the new ways Angolans are imagining the nation.

Embodied Queer Epistemologies: A New Approach to (a Monstrous) Citizenship

“…The imagery of "the nation" would not be complete without these figures, because they play an active part in the making of "us", a chosen collective that is portrayed as better than any of its counterparts. The heroic-like qualities of the imagined nation are displayed in most patriotic symbols, including the flag, the national anthem, national memorials and statues (Martins & Cardina, 2019;Rao, 2021).…”

Bodyland

“…“Eternal glory to our heroes” was one of the charismatic sentences with which Agostinho Neto, the first president of Angola, finished his speech proclaiming the nation's independence. “But which heroes were to bask in this glory?” (Martins and Cardina 2019, 45). Answers to this are explored by a large part of the social science literature on postcolonial Angola.…”

“…Especially during the conflict with their neighbors, who say that Cusseque ought to be “demobilized,” the local honeybees became a political trump card for rescuing Cusseque's residents from the pervasive humanist and juridico‐political principle that contrasts them (humans) with land—an ontological separation that would undermine their legitimate continuity in the place. Key here is that, especially in a postwar national environment that glorifies only the human—“the heroes” (Martins and Cardina 2019, 45)—Cusseque residents convert not the glory but the limitation of being human into a means of political affirmation and asserting legitimacy. This is particularly relevant in the contemporary global era, when “it can no longer be maintained that humans make their own history” (Hamilton 2015, 35).…”