From Traumascapes to Touristscapes: “War Tours” in
Sarajevo and Vukovar
Patrick Naef
Abstract
If the link between war and tourism has already received
considerable academic and media attention, the spatial
representation of war in the tourism sector is still emerging in
the fields of cultural geography and anthropology. In this paper I
seek to explore the rehabilitation and touristification of sites
traumatised by war – which I have approached using the concept
of Traumascape (Tumarkin, 2005) – by presenting two case
studies in the Balkan region: Sarajevo (Bosnia) and Vukovar
(Croatia). These two cities lived through a terrible and traumatic
siege during the Balkan war of the 1990s and are both
undergoing a process of post-conflict reconstruction. Tourists
are now coming back to the region and many are eager to visit
the war heritage left by the conflict. So-called “war tours”,
leading tourists through war-affected areas, are appearing in
these towns: the Time of misfortune tour and the mission
impossible tour in Sarajevo or The soldier’s trail tour in
Vukovar. The touristification of these sites and of the Balkan
war in general raises many questions in terms of the
representation and interpretation of a collective and recent
trauma: why are certain sites “touristified” and others not? Can
tourism foster cooperation and reconciliation between divided
communities? Can tourism be a vector of expression for silent or
peripheral voices? What is the relationship between these sites
and those who visit them? In conclusion I will introduce the
concept of dark tourism which is often used to problematize the
relation between war and tourism and consider it from a critical
perspective.
Key Words: Heritage, tourism, war, memorabilia, Balkan, Vukovar,
Sarajevo, dark tourism, trauma, traumascape.
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1.
Introduction
This paper presents a current research on the rehabilitation of sites
traumatized by war and more specifically on their touristification. It will
explore two case studies taking place in cities characterized by the siege they
lived through during what was commonly named as the Balkan war. Those
towns now expose sites specifically linked to the war to tourists through what
is labelled as “war tours”. In Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia Herzegovina, the
tourism board proposed the Time of Misfortune tour and on another hand a
private guide introduced the war torn heritage of the city through a tour called
the Mission Impossible Tour. In Vukovar, a mid-sized town in East Croatia, a
private tour operator invites tourists to visit the scars of the conflict through a
tour called the Soldier’s Trail. For a good comprehension of the following
text, it is important to first clarify the concept of Traumascape (Tumarkin
2005) in order to put in light its transformation into a touristscape. The
presentation of the case studies will lead to a critical analysis of this existing
field of research problematizing the relation between war and tourism mostly
as it will be shown through the notion of dark tourism (Lennon & Folley
2000, Stone 2006).
Heritage – and in this context war heritage – should be approached
through a dynamic manner, not as a collection of elements simply transmitted
from past to present, but as a permanent creation aiming to respond to
contemporary needs, such as tourism development or the reconstruction of a
war-torn image. Gregory Ashworth for instance insists on its contemporary
dimension:
Heritage is not an artefact or site associated with past times,
conditions, events or personalities. It is a process that uses
sites, objects, and human traits and patterns of behaviours
as vehicles for the transmission of ideas in order to satisfy
various contemporary needs.1
Furthermore now that tourists – local and foreign – come back to visit the
region and the stigmata of war, the rehabilitation and the touristification of
those traumascapes raise a number of questions in terms of interpretation and
representation of a collective trauma, but also regarding economic and
territorial development, or even in terms of reconciliation and social
cohesion: Why are some sites rehabilitated and others not? Can tourism foster
reconciliation between divided communities? Can tourism be a vector of
expression for silent voices? Or on the opposite side, could the
touristification of traumatic elements aim to serve the powers in place?
Finally, while situating a trauma like war in an industry close to leisure, don’t
we risk disconnecting it from its traumatic history? The criteria which
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determined the choice of the case studies will first be presented. Second, an
analysis of those “war tours” will be undertaken and the sites exposed to
tourists through this experience will be put in light.
2.
From Siege to Tourism
Sarajevo in Bosnia Herzegovina and Vukovar in the Croat region of
Slavonia were chosen as case studies. The principal criteria which determine
this choice can be summarized as the following: first those two places lived
through a traumatic siege2 during the war and this has great implications in
the interpretation of the conflict, since the two parties did not have the same
means of fighting at their disposal. Secondly those two cities are totally
divided, in an institutional way in Sarajevo- since the division of Bosnia
Herzegovina in two distinct entities: The Federation of Bosnia Herzegovina
and the Serbian Republic – and in a more informal manner in Vukovar where
Serbian and Croatian communities are totally segregated. This social and
politic fracture is at the heart of the freezing of numerous projects, linked or
not to tourism and conservation. Thirdly those two cities acknowledged an
international Notoriety through Medias such as CNN or Euronews and also
due to cinematographic productions3 which thrust those places into the
forefront of the global scene, generating a particular imaginary for potential
visitors. Finally, both of those places are experiencing the birth of what can
be considered as “war tourism”, through what most of the actors of the field
named as “war tours”: The Mission Impossible Tour and The Time of
Misfortune Tour in Sarajevo and the Soldier’s Trail in Vukovar.
Advertising for the Time of Misfortune Tour. Tourism Board of Sarajevo
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Before taking a close look at the touristification of sites traumatized
by war it is important to explore the notion of traumascape that Maria
Tumarkin defined as a distinct category of places transformed physically and
psychically by a trauma: “[…] traumascapes become much more than
physical settings of tragedies: They emerge as spaces where events are
experienced and re-experienced across time.”4 A trauma, which can be linked
to war, natural disaster or even a terrorist attack, is not only embodied in the
place and the event, but in the way this place and event are lived, experienced
and represented through time. In this context tourism can become a vector of
experience and interpretation of the trauma and the place it is associated with.
Sarajevo is even part of the seven cases that Tumarkin uses as examples to
illustrate her concept of traumascape in her founding book. I’ve chosen to
identify some landmarks of those traumascapes that are Vukovar and
Sarajevo. The two cities are now under a process of post-war reconstruction
and tourism is developing moderately. Foreign visitors have come back to
Sarajevo in significant way since 2005 and Vukovar which wasn’t on the
touristic trail before the war is seeing the appearance of a form of tourism
specifically related to its war History.
3.
Touring through scars of war
« You see smiling people, nice dresses, happy foreigners. It’s
good… But now you are going to see the bad side of Sarajevo. Places that are
not in the map. Places that are not recommended. Places that are covered. »5
Those are the word that the private tour guide Zijad Jusufovic uses to
introduce me to the visit that is going to lead me through the ruins of the last
war. In Sarajevo different tours are offered to visitors willing to see
landmarks related to the war. The Time of Misfortune tour is organized by
Sarajevo tourism office and proposes, after a brief city centre sightseeing in a
minibus, to visit what’s called the Tunnel of Hope. This tunnel was the only
connection during the war between the besieged city and the external world.
It’s now a museum run privately by the family who owns the house where the
entry is situated. Those tours are generally guided by students, who were
often in asylum in the nineties and now have the advantage of speaking
foreign languages. The Mission Impossible tour is independently organized
by Zijad Jusufovic and proposes a more complete panorama of sites,
including, among others, the old bobsleigh track shelled during the war, the
ruins of the anti-fascist monument or the Mujahidin Market. This guide
presents himself as the first legitimate post-war guide and insists on the
impartiality and the veracity of his discourse, and on the uniqueness of his
presentation. He doesn’t hesitate to question tourist office guides’
information, employing a certain liberty of speech unavailable, in
comparison, to other less independent actors:
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“My presentation is little bit different…They [Tourism
Office guides] speak too much…There is too much
information without big possibility to memorize... to
rememorize. And nobody will mention black market for
instance… and the other tunnel they started to build very
close to this tunnel for cars… nobody will mention it.”6
Entrance of the Tunnel of Hope. (By the author, 2010)
In Vukovar, Zoran Sesto, a former Croatian soldier, and his wife
Zrinka, a refugee in Zagreb during the nineties, created a Tour operation
named Danubium Tours. Highlights of the visit are the city Hospital, the last
safe place before the fall of Vukovar, and the Ovcara farm, which saw the
massacre of more than two Hundred civilians and where a memorial now
commemorates their memory. Those sites are the primary motive for visiting,
as this tourist office employee states: “We got mainly daily tourism. Nine out
of ten are coming for those memorials…to do what we stupidly call war
tours”. 7
4.
Private memorials for silent voices?
As I said below, those two cities are experiencing a social and
political dislocation, freezing numerous reconstruction and renovation
projects. The antifascist monument could be a good illustration of this
process. This landmark was edified by Tito after the second war and
destroyed in the nineties. Before this last war it was well known as a place for
school visits as well as a venue for official ceremonies. After the Dayton
agreements, a border dividing the two entities was established, crossing the
ruins of the monument with the purpose of sharing the place equally between
the different communities. For Zijad Jusufovic this led to a statu quo on
every potential renovation project:
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“Dayton agreement put the border here, just to allow to
give chances to both sides if they wanted... It means if they
wanted…No problems! They could have the border 15
meters away and it would have been only to Federation…
But no! They wanted to give chances to both sides. […]
And this is the result… Today here are the needles of the
narco users, condoms of the fuckers… Mafia meeting, a
safe place for narco dealers. […] And now you can’t find
this place on any map.”8
It seems that the future of those sites is determined by many factors going
beyond the simple financial and technical criteria. The social and political
aspects related to this post-war context are crucial to understanding the
dynamics guiding the rehabilitation process of certain sites. Following those
observations could we introduce the idea that independent projects – or even
familial ones – as the Tunnel of Hope or the private operator quoted below,
would be more inclined to overpass those bureaucratic and politic barriers?
Furthermore could those different projects be seen as alternative vectors of
expression for silent and marginal voices?
Tumarkin9 describes The Tunnel of Hope not only as a private
museum, but also as a private memorial. This conceptualization has been
partly confirmed to me by Byro Kollar, the creator and owner of this
museum:
“The problem is the different influences of different
politics… of Croats, Serbs, others… If the official
government had done it [The Tunnel of Hope], maybe
Serbs and Croats would react differently. But now it’s
private!”10
He also adds, referring to the opening speech of the fifteen anniversary of the
construction of this museum:
“I don’t like everybody to talk about the tunnel. Some
politicians tried to use it for their own publicity. I will not
allow politicians to do the discourse; it will be one of the
best students who will read it”11
In this context, could this Museum, and different initiatives presented below
be seen as a challenge to the representation of the trauma by the power in
place? Following this idea it would be interesting to introduce the notions of
gentrification and encirclement that Jenny Edkins assimilates to two different
ways of managing a trauma:
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“We cannot try to address the trauma directly without
risking its gentrification […] Memory and forgetting are
crucial, both in contesting the depoliticisation that goes
under the name of politics, and in keeping open a space for
a genuine political challenge by encircling the trauma
rather than attempting to gentrify it.”12
On another hand, the touristification of traumatized sites raises the question
of their trivialization and historical detachment as stated by Gabriela
Schwenkel on Vietnam: “Despite government efforts to retain its historical
and commemorative significance, Vietnamese youth, in particular, have
transformed the Cu Chi Tunnels into a site of entertainment that is largely
detached from the war.”13 Through her study on the Vietnam War
memorialization she assumes that the way the Cu Chi Tunnels site is
experienced, especially for the Vietnamese youth, generates anti-memorial
functions which suggest a detachment from the traumatic History of Vietnam.
Finally, the question about the status of those sites, between museums and
memorials, should be raised as Paul Williams does in his book on memorial
museums. Williams demonstrates that the traditional difference between
memorials and museums is often blurred, even though:
“A memorial is seen to be, if not apolitical, at least safe in
the refuge of history. […] A historical museum, by
contrast, is presumed to be concerned with interpretation,
contextualization, and critique.”14
5.
Conclusion: War and Dark tourism
In the current literature the link between war and tourism has
already been illustrated by numerous authors. Derek Hall states that: “Sites
associated with war and conflict become particularly popular.15” Valene
Smith even introduces the idea that: “memorabilia of warfare and allied
products constitute the largest single category of tourist attractions in the
world.”16 The touristification of sites related to war are generally
problematized through the notion of dark Tourism or even thanatourism, the
same way as sites linked to natural disasters or terrorism attacks. Such
research is often produced in the fields of hospitality management and
marketing. Most of them are limited to quantitative analyses leading to
results presented through rigid typologies disconnected from reality. Philip
Stone17 for instance intends to point out the different shades of darkness a site
can take on, in a spectrum going from the lightest to the darkest. Following
his idea Auschwitz would be darker that the Museum of Holocaust in
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Washington DC, as the latter is more disconnected from the Second World
War genocide. He defines different categories on this spectrum depending on
dimensions such as education, authenticity, leisure, location, chronological
distance or even the degree of toursitification. I would state that we need a
more comprehensive approach with more qualitative and interdisciplinary
methods to build a reflexion which goes far beyond the tourism sector. The
last remark of Paul Williams on the complexity of differentiating memorials
and museums illustrates, in my opinion, the ambiguities that exist in trying to
situate sites like, for instance, the Tunnel of Hope in well-defined categories.
Notes
1
G Ashworth, ‘In search of place-identity dividend: using heritage
landscapes to create place identity’, in Sense of Place, Health and Quality of
Life. J. Eyles and al. (eds), Ashgate's Geographies of Health series, Canada,
2007, p. 187
2
There still isn’t any real consensus on the exact dates of the Sarajevo siege
which situate itself between April 1992 and February 1996. Regarding the
Siege of Vukovar, it began the 25th of August 1991 and ended the 18th of
November of the same year. Both cities were besieged by Serbian forces
(first named as the Yugoslavian national army (JNA). They then occupied
Vukovar until 1998 and in the case of Sarajevo the end of the siege marked
the end of the conflict following the Dayton agreements signed the 14th 1995
of December in the United states.
3
See for instance Harrison Flowers, Welcome to Sarajevo, The perfect
circle, Sarajevo my love, the Hunting party, etc.
4
Tumarkin A., Traumascapes: The Power and Fate of Places Transformed
by Tragedy. Melbourne University Press, Victoria, 2005. p.12
5
Interview realized in Sarajevo on July 2010.
6
Idem
7
Interview realized in Vukovar on August 2010.
8
Interview realized in Sarajevo on July 2010.
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9
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9
Tumarkin A., Traumascapes: The Power and Fate of Places Transformed
by Tragedy. Melbourne University Press, Victoria, 2005. p. 208
10
Interview realized in Sarajevo on July 2010 (translated form Bosnian).
11
Idem
12
Edkins J., Trauma and the memory of politics. Cambridge University
Press, Cambridge. 2003. p. 15
13
Schwenkel C., The American war in contemporary Vietnam:
Transnational remembrance and representation. Indiana University Press,
Bloomington. 2009. p.97
14
Williams P., Memorial Museums: The global rush to commemorate
atrocities. Berg, Oxford – New York. 2007. p.8
15
Hall D., Tourism and Welfare: Ethics, responsibility, and Sustained Wellbeing. Cabi, Oxfordshire. 2006. p. 69
16
Smith V. “War and tourism: An American ethnography.” Annals of
Tourism Research. 2007. p. 205
17
Stone P., “A dark tourism spectrum: Towards a typology of death and
macabre related tourists and sites, attraction and exhibitions.” Tourism: An
Interdisciplinary International Journal. vol.52. 2006. p.151
Bibliography
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pp. 185-195
Edkins J., Trauma and the memory of politics. Cambridge University Press,
Cambridge. 2003
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Hall D., Tourism and Welfare: Ethics, responsibility, and Sustained Wellbeing. Cabi, Oxfordshire. 2006
Lennon J., Foley M., Dark tourism. The attraction of death and disaster.
Continuum, London - New York. 2000
Schwenkel C., The American war in contemporary Vietnam: Transnational
remembrance and representation. Indiana University Press, Bloomington.
2009
Smith V. “War and tourism: An American ethnography.” Annals of Tourism
Research. 2007. pp. 202-227
Stone P., “A dark tourism spectrum: Towards a typology of death and
macabre related tourists and sites, attraction and exhibitions.” Tourism: An
Interdisciplinary International Journal. vol.52. 2006 145-160
Tumarkin A., Traumascapes: The Power and Fate of Places Transformed by
Tragedy. Melbourne University Press, Victoria, 2005.
Williams P., Memorial Museums: The global rush to commemorate
atrocities. Berg, Oxford – New York. 2007
Patrick Naef is a PhD candidate and a teaching assistant at the
Environmental Sciences Institute, University of Geneva. After graduating in
anthropology, he’s now realizing a thesis in cultural geography on heritage
rehabilitation and tourism development in Croatia and Bosnia Herzegovina.