Culture

Memory Studies

This week's readings discussed the idea of memory and its connection to culture and identity. Memories are versions of ones past that are depicted as words and images (Connerton, 2003). It is how and why a person remembers things that make the study of memories very interesting. According to Coser (1992), Halbwachs believed that there is a definite connection between what people remember and their sense of identity. People tend to identity strongly with the culture in which they live and their relation to that culture. It is through these associations with the culture around them that people remember things. According to Assman (1995), cultural memory is that association of events in ones past with fixed points. The fixed points are fixed events that are maintained and remembered through cultural formation.

According to Kansteiner (2002), collective memory is not just a historical record of things that have happened to people, but rather a collective phenomenon that only manifests itself in the current actions and statements of a person. This notion is further advanced by Assman when he argues that cultural memories are stored archives that occur in the mode of actuality as they are representations that are adopted and given new meaning within new social contexts and historical contexts (Kansteiner, 2002).

According to Connerton (2008), people remember things based upon the management of their current identity and ongoing processes. Forgetting then is part of the process by which new events in ones life lead to new memories that get discarded because they no longer have a relevance to ones present identity. It is thought that old memories do nothing but clutter up ones mind and thus be discarded in order to make room for new and fresh things that are going on in ones life. This means that a person is constantly replacing old memories with new ones, as their association and identity with their current culture is ever evolving.

References

Assman, J. (1995). Collective Memory and Cultural Identity. Retrieved from http://www.history.ucsb.edu/faculty/marcuse/classes/201/articles/95AssmannCollMe

mNGC.pdf

Connerton, P. (2003). How Societies Remember. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Connerton, P. (2008). The Seven Types of Forgetting. Memory Studies January, 1(1), p. 59-

71.

Coser, L.A. (1992). Lewis Halbwachs on Collective Memory. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.

Kansteiner, W. (2002). Finding meaning in memory: a methodological critique of collective memory studies. History & Theory, 41(2), 179-197.