Response 11-9

Ilan Avisar, "The National and the Popular in Israeli Cinema"

1. How and why has the concept of nationalism changed since the end of the Cold War? Why does Avisar emphasize the notion of an “imagined community” when discussing nationalism? What are the negative and positive connotations of nationalism?

It is believed nationalism lead to the first and second World Wars. Since the Cold War it has caused problems in Eastern Europe, Africa, and the Middle East with developing countries of former colonial rule. Avisar feels nations and a sense of nationalism are not real things, they are just made up to give people false senses of control and freedom. Nationalism can unite people of a country who only have the nation as a common bridge, but it can also build up the wall between the “us” and the “them” separating people from one another.

2. What are the three principal historical forces guiding the movement of Zionism as it emerged in the 19th century? How do these three forces correspond to Benedict Anderson’s definition of the nation?

First, the Jewish people were tired of living in exile and wished to return to Zion, the homeland. Second, they wanted to escape anti-Semitism. Third, they had a sense of nationalism, with values of self-determination, preservation of national heritage and to build a cultural identity.

3. If there was no “indigenous Jewish national culture” because there was no Jewish state, how was Jewish identity and culture defined and expressed before the establishment of Israel?

Jewish culture was based on the religious practices. The “men of letters” expressed the Jewish national identity of wanting a homeland, the use of Hebrew as a common language, and recalling common texts of myths and folklore.

4. What other ideologies of Jewish existence competed with Zionism in the 19th and 20th centuries? What characterized Zionism in contrast to these competing ideologies (what ideals were the “backbone” of Zionism)?

One ideology was to assimilate with Europeans; another was a Marxist revolution; and the third held America as the promise land. Zionism, in contrast, wanted Jews to unite and work together for their common good. It encouraged hard agricultural labor, collectivism, and the combat of hardships and threats in the homeland.

5. What irony does Avisar observe about the rise of overtly critical political films in the 1980s? How have these critical political films affected the relationship between the Israeli cinema and its own local audience? What replaced this cycle of critical political films in the 1990s and 2000s?

He observes the films were having a redundant effect because politicians and news organizations were also discussing the same political issues. Film as a medium for political and social protest was unneeded. The local audience turned away from these films creating a gap between the Israeli cinema and the audience. What filled in the vacuum of political films was a series of liter films which used humor to discuss the relationship between Israelis and Palestinians. These films are more compassionate toward the characters and the settings. They helped build a constructive dialogue between the Israeli filmmakers and their local audiences.