Offended by Bronze. Monuments, Speech Acts and Memory Competence

This paper seeks to provide an inquiry into the study of monuments and memory, basing it on Speech Act Theory as proposed by John L. Austin (1962). After considering the way in which monuments can “say” things that change and affect the collective perception of the past, I deal with a particular kind of effect that they can produce: offense. Putting into dialogue elements of Speech Act Theory, Cultural Semiotics and Memory Studies, I investigate in which cases and by virtue of what a monument can be intended as offensive. In particular, I analyse offense not from the citizens’ perspective but from that of embassies and governments. This point of view, being more focused on inter- national relations and on outward orientations of institutional pride, allows me to consider the defense mechanism used to protect official memory and the image of the nation. Moreover, looking at two case studies – the D’Annunzio monument in Trieste, Italy (2019) which “offended” Croatia, and the monu- ment in memory of Korean comfort women in Busan, South Korea (2016), which was seen as an outrage by Japan – I demonstrate how the “memory competences” can influence dynamics of non-recognition or misrecognition of actantial and then thematic roles in past event narratives.