Archipelago of Memories

2020 ◽  
pp. 53-80
Author(s):  
Neville Bolt
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
State Control ◽  
Story Telling ◽  
Individual Group ◽  
Global Networks ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future

Chapter 2 looks at how individual, group, and collective memory construction occurs in societies; how memories are blended into a form of story-telling that seeks to overturn the hegemonic account of history on which states are built and which is propagated through media outlets over generations. A constant process of reshaping and retelling the insurgent story challenges state control of history. Insurgents seeks to control the past, to take ownership of the present, in order to legitimize their right to the future. Propaganda of the Deed’s violent and heroic acts that travel as electronic images through global networks resonate with the constructed past––a past structured around moments of suffering, grievance, and atrocity.

Collective Memory: Between Values and Historical Knowledge

2020 ◽  
pp. 124-142
Author(s):  
VICTOR BURLACHUK
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
Rapid Change ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
The State ◽  
Main Element ◽  
Rapid Decline ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future

At the end of the twentieth century, questions of a secondary nature suddenly became topical: what do we remember and who owns the memory? Memory as one of the mental characteristics of an individual’s activity is complemented by the concept of collective memory, which requires a different method of analysis than the activity of a separate individual. In the 1970s, a situation arose that gave rise to the so-called "historical politics" or "memory politics." If philosophical studies of memory problems of the 30’s and 40’s of the twentieth century were focused mainly on the peculiarities of perception of the past in the individual and collective consciousness and did not go beyond scientific discussions, then half a century later the situation has changed dramatically. The problem of memory has found its political sound: historians and sociologists, politicians and representatives of the media have entered the discourse on memory. Modern society, including all social, ethnic and family groups, has undergone a profound change in the traditional attitude towards the past, which has been associated with changes in the structure of government. In connection with the discrediting of the Soviet Union, the rapid decline of the Communist Party and its ideology, there was a collapse of Marxism, which provided for a certain model of time and history. The end of the revolutionary idea, a powerful vector that indicated the direction of historical time into the future, inevitably led to a rapid change in perception of the past. Three models of the future, which, according to Pierre Nora, defined the face of the past (the future as a restoration of the past, the future as progress and the future as a revolution) that existed until recently, have now lost their relevance. Today, absolute uncertainty hangs over the future. The inability to predict the future poses certain challenges to the present. The end of any teleology of history imposes on the present a debt of memory. Features of the life of memory, the specifics of its state and functioning directly affect the state of identity, both personal and collective. Distortion of memory, its incorrect work, and its ideological manipulation can give rise to an identity crisis. The memorial phenomenon is a certain political resource in a situation of severe socio-political breaks and changes. In the conditions of the economic crisis and in the absence of a real and clear program for future development, the state often seeks to turn memory into the main element of national consolidation.

scholarly journals Srebrenica is not a Metaphor

2021 ◽  
pp. 54-64
Author(s):  
Sarina Bakić
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Bosnia And Herzegovina ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Future ◽  
Temporal Dimensions ◽  
Further Development

The author will emphasize the importance of both the existence and the further development of the Srebrenica - Potočari Memorial Center, in the context of the continued need to understand the genocide that took place in and around Srebrenica, from the aspect of building a culture of remembrance throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H). This is necessary in order to continue fighting the ongoing genocide denial. At first glance, a culture of remembrance presupposes immobility and focus on the past to some, but it is essentially dynamic, and connects three temporal dimensions: it evokes the present, refers to the past but always deliberates over the future. In this paper, the emphasis is placed on the concept of the place of remembrance, the lieu de memoire as introduced by the historian Pierre Nora. In this sense, a place of remembrance such as the Srebrenica - Potočari Memorial Center is an expression of a process in which people are no longer just immersed in their past but read and analyze it in the present. Furthermore, looking to the future, they also become mediators of relations between people and communities, which in sociological theory is an important issue of social relations. The author of this paper emphasizes that collective memory in the specific case of genocide in and around Srebrenica is only possible when the social relations around the building (Srebrenica - Potočari Memorial Center) crystallize, which is then much more than just the content of the culture of remembrance.

scholarly journals UGA SEBAGAI MEMORY KOLEKTIF MASYARAKAT SUNDA (Uga Sunda Community as a Collective Memory)

2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 55
Author(s):  
Nandang Rusnandar
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
Oral Tradition ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Future

Uga merupakan salah satu tradisi lisan masyarakat Sunda, di dalamnya terkumpul segenap memori kolektif. Analisis terhadap uga meliputi nilai-nilai dalam bentuk simbol yang tersirat di dalamnya. Uga mampu meramalkan perubahan sosial sesuai dengan zamannya. Apabila dilihat dari orientasi waktu, uga dapat  menunjukkan: (1) tercipta dan dituturkan pada masa lampau; (2) dituturkan pada masa lampau dan terjadi pada waktu lalu; (3) dituturkan pada masa lampau dan sekarang (sedang terjadi); (4) dituturkan pada masa lampau, ramalan untuk masa yang akan datang. Fungsi uga di samping memprediksi ia juga harus dijadikan sebagai alat antisipasi tentang sesuatu yang bakal terjadi di waktu yang akan datang.Abstract:Uga is one of Sundanese oral tradition containing most collective memory. Analysis of the Uga includes the values in the form of symbols that implied in it. It  is able to predict social change in accordance with its time when viewed from the orientation of time. It  can  show that (1) it could be created and spoken in the past; (2) it was spoken and taken place in the past;(3) it was spoken in the past and is still being used now; (4)  it was spoken in the past and predictions for the future. Besides its functions to predict the social change, it  can serve as a tool in anticipation of something that might happen in the future.

Savoring Polishness: History and Tradition in Contemporary Polish Food Media

2021 ◽  
pp. 088832542110634
Author(s):  
Agata Bachórz ◽  
Fabio Parasecoli
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
Cultural Memory ◽  
Media Representations ◽  
The West ◽  
Attitudes And Practices ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
Current Concerns ◽  
Food Media

This article examines the future-oriented use of the culinary past in Poland’s food discourse through a qualitative analysis of popular food media (printed magazines and TV). We analyze how interpretations of food and culinary practices from the past are connected to contemporary debates. We contend that media representations of the culinary past co-create projects of Polish modernization in which diverse voices vie for hegemony by embracing different forms of engagement with the West and by imagining the future shape of the community. We distinguish between a pragmatic and a foodie type of culinary capital and focus on how they differently and at times paradoxically frame cultural memory and tradition. We observe the dynamics of collective memory and oblivion, and assess how interpretations of specific periods in Poland’s past are negotiated in the present through representations of material culture and practices revolving around food, generating not only contrasting evaluations of the past but also diverging economies of the future. Finally, we explore tradition as a set of present-day values, attitudes, and practices that are connected with the past, but respond to current concerns and visions of the future.

TRANSFORMING THE LEGACY OF LAND DISPOSSESSION: ARCHIVE, ORALITY AND HEALING IN THE CONTEXT OF SAN STORY-TELLING

2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 44-54
Author(s):  
Marlene Winberg
Keyword(s):  
Oral History ◽  
Digital Technology ◽  
Story Telling ◽  
The Past ◽  
Land Dispossession ◽  
The Future ◽  
Archival Documents ◽  
Northern Cape

This article examines ways in which we engage the archive and orality to negotiate traumatic pasts in order to transform the legacy of land dispossession. It hones in on the silences of the archive and asks how we draw the inheritance of archival documents and materials into dialogue with living orality and places in the landscape. Who is remembering knowledges and meaning in the landscape of the Northern Cape and how is this being done against the poignant backdrop of the losses resulting from dispossession? How does inter-generational dialogue become an agent in shaping the inheritance of the future? Given the complexity of history and our reading of the past, what does it mean to become a good ancestor? What role could digital technology play in re-shaping identity and heritage among the storytellers, teenagers, ritual specialists and others who populate the region? This study examines the complex tensions between these questions in the context of specific oral history and storytelling projects that took place in previously dispossessed communities in the Northern Cape between 2003 and 2013.

scholarly journals Multicultural Education Past, Present, and Future: Struggles for Dialog and Power-Sharing

2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine E. Sleeter
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Social Movements ◽  
Multicultural Education ◽  
The United States ◽  
Power Sharing ◽  
State Control ◽  
Global Expansion ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future

Using Kymlicka’s analysis of conflicts between “imperatives of state control” and “objectives of social movements,” I draw on my experiences with multicultural education to extrapolate some trends from the past and present that may inform the future. After briefly describing the origins of multicultural education (mainly within the United States), I situate struggles over education in the context of the global expansion of neoliberalism, critique “neoliberal multicultural education,” then briefly describe some efforts that push back. This essay concludes with four recommendations for moving forward.

scholarly journals Pentecostalism as a Theological Tradition

Pneuma ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 42 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 521-535
Author(s):  
Wolfgang Vondey
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
Institutional Critique ◽  
The Past ◽  
Anthony Giddens ◽  
Pentecostal Theology ◽  
The Future ◽  
Late Modern ◽  
Normative Content

Abstract The concern for a theological tradition among Pentecostals responds to pressing questions of the recognition, invention, and rejection of tradition in late modern society and religion. Tradition, to put it succinctly, is a concern not for the past but for the future of Pentecostalism. This essay critically examines the challenges of designating pentecostal theology as a global tradition by asking what theological elements constitute Pentecostalism as a tradition, what are the dominant theological patterns of its reenactment, and how these constructs aid or resist the formation of pentecostal theology in the future. The quest for answers follows the five essential patterns of tradition proposed by Anthony Giddens: collective memory, ritual expression, a formulaic conception of truth, guardians of the tradition, and its normative content. The results form an ideological, historical, and institutional critique of Pentecostalism and its existential challenges as a theological tradition.

Is Turkey coming to terms with its past? Politics of memory and majoritarian conservatism

2013 ◽  
Vol 41 (5) ◽  
pp. 691-708 ◽  
Author(s):  
Onur Bakiner
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
Shared Memory ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
State Control ◽  
Politics Of Memory ◽  
The Past ◽  
Popular Appeal ◽  
Turkish State ◽  
Past Wrongs

There is unprecedented domestic and international interest in Turkey's political past, accompanied by a societal demand for truth and justice in addressing past human rights violations. This article poses the question: Is Turkey coming to terms with its past? Drawing upon the literature on nationalism, identity, and collective memory, I argue that the Turkish state has recently taken steps to acknowledge and redress some of the past human rights violations. However, these limited and strategic acts of acknowledgment fall short of initiating a more comprehensive process of addressing past wrongs. The emergence of the Justice and Development Party as a dominant political force brings along the possibility that the discarded Kemalist memory framework will be replaced by what I callmajoritarian conservatism, a new government-sanctioned shared memory that promotes uncritical and conservative-nationalist interpretations of the past that have popular appeal, while enforcing silence on critical historiographies that challenge this hegemonic memory and identity project. Nonetheless, majoritarian conservatism will probably fail to assert state control over memory and history, even under a dominant government, as unofficial memory initiatives unsettle the hegemonic appropriation of the past.

scholarly journals ‘Telling a past, dreaming a future’ (Walter Brueggemann) - Die essensie van die narratiewe pastoraat

2000 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 316-325
Author(s):  
J. C. M ◽  
J. Laas
Keyword(s):  
Story Telling ◽  
Transformative Power ◽  
The Past ◽  
Finding Meaning ◽  
Double Movement ◽  
The Future ◽  
Walter Brueggemann

“Telling a past, dreaming a future” - The essence of narrative pastoral counsellingThe article examines the possibilities of negotiating the double movement created by living towards the future and dreaming out of the future into the present. Story telling in the pastoral environment is suggested as a means of bringing together the past and the expected future. A circular approach to time can help immensely by bringing together past and future in a meaningful way. This becomes possible in the pastoral environment where there is real understanding between pastor and client through thorough communication and the reframing of the past. The importance of language in understanding and the transformative power of narrative are stressed, as well as Christian hope as the most fundamental way of finding meaning out of the future into the present.

Memory politics in the future tense: Exceptionalism, race, and insurrection in America

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (6) ◽  
pp. 1272-1284
Author(s):  
Piotr M Szpunar
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
American Exceptionalism ◽  
Future Tense ◽  
Memory Politics ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Future ◽  
To Come

The grounding myth of American collective memory is built on the idea of America as a promise, what it shall be. Crises place futures in doubt. Against these two considerations, this article examines how the future can be used to shape the past. In the American context, the future as a general promise is invoked in times of crisis to reassure a nation by way of laundering difficult pasts so as to fit a narrative of progress in spite of the continued presence and recursive nature of these pasts. In the immediate wake of the 2021 Capitol Insurrection, another crisis (itself a harbinger of crises to come), the 2000 Bush v Gore decision, was rewritten as an exemplar of American exceptionalism rather than a stain on it. Beyond displaying the intricate relationship between future and past in collective memory, the case highlights how this operation only works to further neglect the racism and unresolved pasts entrenched in the myth of exceptionalism that motivated the Capitol Riot.

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