POLITICAL GRAFFITI OF EXTREME NATIONALISM AS A PROPAGANDA MEDIA IN NOVI SAD, THE EUROPEAN CAPITAL OF CULTURE

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to consider and analyse the contradiction between the fact that Novi Sad is the European Capital of Culture for 2022, while, at the same time, facades of various buildings, as well as public surfaces, are inscribed with extreme nationalist political graffiti. The subject of this paper is a critical discourse analysis of graffiti, which has been deepened with a theoretical approach to the insufficiently researched problematic of political graffiti. Political graffiti can become a place of resistance against authoritarianism, oppression, and injustice during times of social and political upheaval (Chaffee, 1988). This is especially common during periods of authoritarianism and extreme repression, in times where the opponents of the regime organize “hit and run” actions, but it is also commonly used by the regime, which attempts to mobilize the masses in this way (Johnston, 2006). At the same time, graffiti can become more problematic – they can have ultranationalist, xenophobic and racist messages. In this way, they are becoming a medium to attack minorities in society (Zaimakis, 2015). Graffiti today are not only an instrument of the political opposition but are increasingly being used as a “weapon of the strong”, that is, a medium of political structures in power. The central topic of critical discourse analysis as a scientific method is the relation between language and power, which is why it was chosen for the methodological framework of this paper. In this specific case, the subject of the critical discourse analysis are graffiti celebrating people who have been sentenced to life in prison for their judicially proven liability for mass war crimes in the Yugoslav Wars in the 1990s. Also, the paper includes graffiti with racist and Neo-Nazi content. The subject of analysis are also graffiti celebrating the Russian Federation’s invasion of Ukraine. All of the abovementioned content is exactly opposite of traditional values of Vojvodina, such as multiethnicity, multiculturality, multiconfessionalism and  multilingualism, which are also the values on which the European Union was founded. The EU gave Novi Sad the title of European Capital of Culture for 2022. With the absence of determination of liability and the sanctioning of the authors of such hate graffiti, the authorities are sending a dangerous message to the public that such behaviour is allowed. This supports the thesis that ”… graffiti are not anymore the medium of the political opposition, but are more often becoming the medium of political structures in power”. That is: “graffiti can be a medium of revolt – or repression” (Velikonja, 2020).