Beasts from the East: Fantasies of Eastern Europeanness in Brexit-era BBC Drama

Julia Eva Havas; Anna Mártonfi; Gábor Gergely

Beasts from the East: Fantasies of Eastern Europeanness in Brexit-era BBC Drama

Julia Eva Havas, Anna Mártonfi, Gábor Gergely

Theatre, Film, TV and Interactive Media

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

This article interrogates the figure of the Eastern European itinerant in contemporary prestige BBC drama to highlight the figure’s role in mobilising ideas of nationhood and foreignness in Brexit-era Britain. Our critical analyses of Dracula (BBC1, 2020), Killing Eve (BBC America, 2018-), and Call the Midwife (BBC1, 2012-) show that programming that putatively celebrates British multiculturalism and diversity configures the Eastern European foreigner as a threat to idea(l)s of Britishness, by deploying this figure in strikingly similar imaginaries of contagion, deviance, and savagery. Such treatment embeds these portrayals in discourses of white nationalism that seek to manage national belonging by articulating the limits and rules of the national community as implicitly racialized terms of culture and space.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	48-63
Number of pages	16
Journal	VIEW: Journal of European Television History and Culture
Volume	10
Issue number	20
Publication status	Published - 2021

Keywords

BBC drama
Killing Eve
Call the Midwife
Dracula
gender
Eastern Europe

Access to Document

https://viewjournal.eu/articles/10.18146/view.265/#

Cite this

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title = "Beasts from the East: Fantasies of Eastern Europeanness in Brexit-era BBC Drama",

abstract = "This article interrogates the figure of the Eastern European itinerant in contemporary prestige BBC drama to highlight the figure{\textquoteright}s role in mobilising ideas of nationhood and foreignness in Brexit-era Britain. Our critical analyses of Dracula (BBC1, 2020), Killing Eve (BBC America, 2018-), and Call the Midwife (BBC1, 2012-) show that programming that putatively celebrates British multiculturalism and diversity configures the Eastern European foreigner as a threat to idea(l)s of Britishness, by deploying this figure in strikingly similar imaginaries of contagion, deviance, and savagery. Such treatment embeds these portrayals in discourses of white nationalism that seek to manage national belonging by articulating the limits and rules of the national community as implicitly racialized terms of culture and space.",

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AB - This article interrogates the figure of the Eastern European itinerant in contemporary prestige BBC drama to highlight the figure’s role in mobilising ideas of nationhood and foreignness in Brexit-era Britain. Our critical analyses of Dracula (BBC1, 2020), Killing Eve (BBC America, 2018-), and Call the Midwife (BBC1, 2012-) show that programming that putatively celebrates British multiculturalism and diversity configures the Eastern European foreigner as a threat to idea(l)s of Britishness, by deploying this figure in strikingly similar imaginaries of contagion, deviance, and savagery. Such treatment embeds these portrayals in discourses of white nationalism that seek to manage national belonging by articulating the limits and rules of the national community as implicitly racialized terms of culture and space.

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