Vernacular voices and contested meanings: contemporary uses of the swastika in Latvia

Similar visual forms can have different meanings and the messages that symbols carry are context specific. Some of the symbols are inevitably contested due to their historical uses. This article explores what is probably the most notorious of contested symbols: the swastika and its local variant in Latvia, the ugunskrusts (Cross of Fire). With the aim of analyzing vernacular narratives connected with contemporary uses of the ugunskrusts in Latvia, the article focuses on situations in which there is a conscious choice to use the ugunskrusts with the intention of reclaiming and rehabilitating the symbol for artistic and spiritual reasons, based on a belief in the symbol’s benign nature and with the help of narratives of cultural heritage. Despite these claims, however, the cases are not just about symbols or cultural heritage, but are just as much about historical conflicts in the past and current political affairs. Thus, the article shows how different national experiences of crimes committed by totalitarian regimes of the twentieth century determine the interpretation of, and attitude toward, the use of symbols connected with these regimes. I examine how collective memory battles are mirrored in the use of this contested symbol. Despite the voices that deny the negative connotation of the symbol locally, the image of the swastika in the western world is inevitably tied to Nazism. Therefore, I look at how the attitude toward this symbol correlates with the interpretation of World War II in the collective memory of Latvia. The article is based on in-depth ethnographic interviews conducted since 2017.