Beyond Memory

Abstract

This book provides a fresh perspective on the familiar belief that memory policies are successful in building peaceful societies. Whether in a stable democracy or in the wake of a violent political conflict, this book argues that memory policies are largely unhelpful in preventing hate, genocide, and mass crimes. Since the 1990s, transmitting the memory of violent pasts has been used in attempts to foster tolerance and fight racism, hate and antisemitism. However, countries that invested in memory policies have overseen the rise of hate crimes and populisms instead of growing social cohesion. Breaking with the usual moralistic position, this book takes stock of this situation. Where do these memory policies come from? Whom do they serve? Can we make them more effective? In other words, can we really learn from the past? At a time when memory studies is blooming, this book questions the normative belief in the effects of memory.

Collective memory and autobiographical memory: Perspectives from the humanities and cognitive sciences

“…Such initiatives have started from the premise that collective remembrance of dark moments of the national past has a potential "healing" or "curative" function, sometimes likened to an individual recalling memories of an earlier trauma-although most historians would agree that using language such as "repressed memories" or "trauma" in the context of the nation is only metaphorical. In other words, collective memory is imagined here to have a prophylactic function, stopping societies from repeating the collective mistakes of the past via an engagement with "memory politics" (Gensburger & Lefranc, 2020). This agenda can be seen particularly clearly where states have initiated programs for transitional justice or reconciliation in post-conflict situations, but it is equally visible in the "memory politics" of stable democracies around the world.…”

Making and contesting far right sites of memory. A case study on Romania

“…I prefer to indicate the second group as memory militants (Conan and Rousso, 1998: 112). Memory activism creates an independent social world in which anyone can argue a position and try to achieve public legitimacy for the group (Gensburger and Lefranc, 2020: 100–102). Within this social world, memory entrepreneurs are those who most proficiently master the materials of the past, with a holistic vision of their positioning in the public debate: they know when and where to say and do what, and how.…”

Beyond multidirectional memory: Opening pathways to politics and solidarity

“…Over the last decade or so, memory studies as a field has seen a rising awareness of a crises of a paradigm commonly described as cosmopolitan (Levy and Sznaider 2005) and once cherished for its promise to ensure a regime of human rights on a global scale. A sense of crisis-or, indeed, collapse-encouraged scholars in our field to rethink the memory/politics nexus by identifying the limits of cosmopolitan Holocaust memory (Bull and Hansen 2016, Gensburger and Lefranc 2020, David 2020, Spišiaková et al 2020, Pisanty 2021. Concurrently, Michael Rothberg's theory of multidirectional memory (Rothberg 2009) became a key reference point in transcultural memory studies (see Lorenz 2020: 39-42) and a popular model to respond to at least some the challenges posed by the current crises.…”