Geopolitical Imaginaries: Croatian Diasporic Writers in North America

Abstract:The article examines the emergence of new post–Cold War geopolitical imaginaries in the creative work of Croatian American writers Josip Novakovich and Neda Miranda Blažević-Krietzman. This work addresses memories of (post)socialism, develops transnationalized images of the wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, fictionalizes emigration from these geographies, and imagines new forms of transnationalism between the United States and Croatia. The work of Novakovich and Blažević-Krietzman was enabled by the end of the Cold War, which has shifted US cultural politics and reinscribed the significance of Eastern European geographies into the US imaginary. Novakovich’s and Blažević-Krietzman’s transnational positions have allowed them to create innovative form and content in ways that enhance the global appeal and reception of their work. Furthermore, their dual experience of socialism and capitalism has enabled the two writers to intervene in unique ways in contemporary debates about history and memory. In its choice of themes, protagonists, and locations, their writing strongly advocates for a new transnational literature, while also asking for the development of new critical models for the study of transnationalism in US literature and culture.