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Historical Glances at Eurovision, From The Past To ‘1944’ and Beyond Written by on May 15, 2016 | 3 Comments

Despite being a non-political event, Eurovision has a long list of songs that embrace a nation’s culture and history. This year, Jamala’s victorious ‘1944’ is the most notable example. But what’s the actual story behind Ukraine’s song and its charismatic singer? Samantha Ross takes a look at Jamala’s familial and artistic history, and how they fit into the message of this year’s winning Eurovision song, and into the Contest as a whole.

Generally speaking, Eurovision is not meant to be a political contest, with blatantly inflammatory or pointed messages nixed, as in the case of ‘We Don’t Wanna Put In’. However, there is a distinction between “political” and “historical”, and few songs in Eurovision’s back catalogue have danced upon that line (and possibly lit it on fire) quite like Ukraine’s entry for this year, ‘1944’ by Jamala. By sending a personal song about a historical event that echoes into today’s news, this mugham-infused dark jazz-pop composition has divided opinions and raised eyebrows, both musically and thematically.

This is certainly not the first time that history has been referenced in the Song Contest.

Musical Lessons

The Eurovision Song Contest, by virtue of embracing ethnic and national diversity, always flirts with the idea of veering towards cultural themes and issues. Jamala is sharing the story of her family’s exile and heartbreak at a time when Crimea happens to be firmly back in the international spotlight, but ‘1944‘, at its heart, is a historical retelling of a facet of history.

This is not something new to the Song Contest. Just last year, Genealogy honored the centennial of the Armenian Genocide with ‘Face the Shadow‘, and the same delegation made allusions to the nation’s shared history a few years earlier with ‘Apricot Stone’. Back in 1990, a number of songs referenced the fall of the Berlin Wall and the political unification of Europe. Entries like ‘Brandenburger Tor‘, ‘Keinen mauern mehr‘, and eventual winner ‘Insieme: 1992‘ all touched upon issues that were affecting the continent at the time. Bosnia and Herzegovina’s debut song in 1992, ‘Sva bol svieta‘, referenced the ongoing war in their homeland.

These songs didn’t point fingers or make accusations; they simply highlighted the events, past or present, that united a nation and its people.

Sürgünlik

So, now that we’ve looked at earlier examples of history at Eurovision, what about Ukraine’s song for 2016, ‘1944‘? In order to understand the situation (and the song), we need to take a look at who the Crimean Tatars are and what they’ve gone through, as a population. Generally speaking, the Crimean Tatars are a Turkic ethnic group that were first recorded in the region over six hundred years ago. Primarily Sunni Muslim, estimations on their numbers vary between half a million and over six million (depending on who you ask and their calculation methods).

A large diaspora of Tatars exists in Turkey, Uzbekistan, and Ukraine, but their largest numbers are in Crimea, where they number just around a quarter of a million, or about 12 percent of the current population. Since the turn of the twentieth century, the percentage of Crimea’s Tatar population has fluctuated wildly, from 35.55% in 1897 to no recorded population in the 1959 and 1970 censuses, to the slowly re-climbing numbers today.

The reason for that fluctuation is at the heart of ‘1944’.

As with most historical events, there are multiple ways to look at the story, and it’s incredibly tough to detail the history of the region without potentially offending people, so I’ll try to keep this somewhat brief. In 1941 and 1942, the Crimean Peninsula, previously controlled by the Soviets, fell to the Germans. The Soviet resistance against the invasion often made attacks against the local Crimean Tatar civilian population for runs on supplies. A small group of Tatars created defensive militias that were sanctioned by the occupying Germans. Some had actually been prisoners of war captured from Red Army battalions and were given the choice to either languish in prisoner of war camps or join the militias. Even though the number of men in these militias was small compared to the large numbers of Tatar men fighting in the Red Army, the entire population was painted with the same treasonous brush.  When the Soviet Union regained control of the region in 1944, steps were made to rid Crimea of the Tatars.

Approximately 200,000 Tatars (primarily women and children) were evicted from their homes with little notice. They were forced onto train cars with little or no ventilation, food, water, or hygienic facilities, and shipped off to a number of far-flung places to the east. Of those 200,000, it is estimated that about 5 percent died en route to their destinations, and many thousands more died in the years that immediately followed due to a lack of housing and food in their new locations. It took until 1968 for the Soviet government to drop the charges of treason, but they were not completely welcomed back into their homeland until the mid-1980s.

May 18th, less than a week after the Eurovision Final, marks a Ukrainian Day of Remembrance for the victims of the expulsion and genocide of Crimean Tatars, or Sürgünlik in Tatar.

Echoes From Nazylkhan

One person who was a victim of this deportation was a woman named Nazylkhan, whose husband was fighting on the side of the Red Army when she and her four children were deported. One of those children, a daughter, died en route to Central Asia and was not given a proper burial. Nazylkhan’s great-granddaughter, Susana Jamaladynova, returned to Crimea when the doors of repatriation were opened in the 1980s and grew up to sing about her family’s history on one of the largest stages in the world, right as her homeland was back into the global spotlight.

Susana, who took the stage name Jamala, first came to the attention of Eurovision fans back in 2011 with the swinging, jazzy, irrepressibly fun ‘Smile‘, which came in 3rd place in a hotly contested Ukrainian National Final. But since then, her music has transformed from the bright and sunny melodies of ‘You’re Made of Love‘ and ‘It’s Me, Jamala‘ to the more emotional, introspective works found on her most recent album, ‘Podykh‘. Listening to songs like ‘Inie (Other)‘ and ‘Schlaych Dodomu (The Way to Home)‘. Her work has undoubtedly matured in the past five years, as artists tend to do. She has taken the time to discover herself and delve into the themes that mean something to her.

By singing about the Sürgünlik, Jamala has become a beacon as well as a lightning rod, showing the world a bit of history that is rarely covered in history textbooks. While this is a deeply personal family history for her, she said in her press conference (as well as in an interview with Eurovision Ireland) that this means so much more to her than even that. In her own words, “if you really respect venerate your family, your own culture and history, you learn how to respect other cultures. It’s the way we could make this world better.” Furthermore, by spreading the word about even the darkest chapters in human history, a single voice can hopefully make an impact and play a small part in having prevented other atrocities like this in the future.

From ‘1944’ To ‘2016’

Just because the Eurovision Song Contest isn’t intended to be a political event doesn’t mean the Song Contest should be devoid of culture, and a major part of culture is a group’s shared history. Whether a song’s lyrics talk about tragedy or triumph, it is important to be able to honor one’s past. And now, tonight, as the dust settles on another incredible Eurovision night, voters and jurors from around Europe and Australia came together to honor Jamala and her history, as well as our own collective history. As she said tonight in her winner’s press conference, “I always knew if you sing about truth, you can touch people. And I was right.”

As we all know, the Eurovision Song Contest was created as a way to unite broadcasters and strengthen technological ties, but as a side consequence, it has allowed us a forum to examine the wounds of our not-so-distant past. Tonight, Europe and Australia put Susana Jamaladanova and her great-grandmother Nazylkhan in the spotlight, and has gotten us to discuss something that many of us had no knowledge of.

But more importantly, as Jamala has said repeatedly, this is a family story. If the greatest lesson we learn from tonight is simply to love our families, hold them tight through times of trouble, and treat those around us with love and respect, then we’re all ahead of the game.

After all, SVT told us to ‘Come Together’, didn’t they?

About The Author: Samantha Ross

Vaguely aware of the Contest since childhood, a fanatic since 2008, and an ESC blogger since 2009, Samantha Ross made her first sojourn to Eurovision in 2011, and was quickly welcomed into the fold at ESC Insight. Over the years, she's been interviewed by BBC World News, SVT, LBC Radio, and many others. She was a semi-regular contributor to Oystermouth Radio's weekly dedicated Eurovision program, "Wales 12 Points". Furthermore, Samantha contributed to BBC Radio 2's coverage of the Copenhagen contest, and was a member of the official JuniorEurovision.tv web team in 2014 and 2015. She also worked as a member of the Bulgarian Delegation, serving as Assistant Head of Press in Kyiv and Lisbon. She is also the creator of the podcast "12 Points from America", an irreverent look at Eurovision from a US point of view. When not at Eurovision, Samantha is a regular on the Twin Cities pub quiz circuit, and has volunteered as a moderator for the local high school quiz bowl for over ten years. She lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota, but is wistfully looking for opportunities to get geographically closer to the heart of the Eurovision action. You can follow Samantha on Twitter (@escinsider).

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3 responses to “Historical Glances at Eurovision, From The Past To ‘1944’ and Beyond”

  1. John Egan says:

    12 points Sam!

  2. Joshua says:

    It’s a shame that you did not mention Greece 1976 Panaghia Mou, as it does share several parallels with ‘1944’. while the lyrics are none specific and seem generally pacifist, the context of this coming as the Greek entry the year after Turkish forces seized the northern part of Cyprus Island.

  3. Samantha Ross says:

    You’re absolutely right, Joshua! Great example from 40 years ago…the more things change, the more they stay the same, I suppose!

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