Talk:Cultural memory

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This is the discussion/talk page for: Cultural memory.

Tag

I tagged this as technical, and I'm not sure how specifically to phrase this. It seems to be describing a theory from a certain book or writer in minute detail with very little relation to other issues. —BlackTerror 19:47, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Unusual not technical

18-Oct-2007: I have been editing several technical articles (such as "Discrete Fourier transform") to add simplified wording, but this article "Cultural memory" is not too technical, just unusual in content. The article doesn't even mention "synapse" (or "ganglion cell"). Actual overly technical articles typically have more than 3 rare terms in a sentence (such as aquifer, aquitard & aquiclude) or contain several mathematical formulas; however, this article doesn't involve any of those technical issues. I have removed tag "{{technical}}" and suggest writing a more detailed analysis as to why the article is troublesome. Please don't tag an article as "technical" just because it is unusual. -Wikid77 02:35, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

importance?

(copied from a discussion on my talk page 00:02, 24 August 2009 (UTC))

Hello, DGG. First, let me assure you that I have not been involved in any way with editing/ tagging or discussing this article with any other editor. I just came across it today while doing a Google search for "Nostalgic Depression" (a wholly-unrelated subject). I can't quite pin down exactly why, but I feel this article is unsalvageable and should be deleted. I thought you might be a good resource to consult, as you have access to collegiate library resources. Some obvious problems I can say about the article are:

• Lacks inline citations for numerous statements that are either stated opinions or apparent statements of fact that are likely to be challenged
• Does not have a lead paragraph that provides context for the reader prior to getting into deep technical discussion
• Is written in the wrong voice; speaks directly to the reader and uses "your" and "our", (like a children's encyclopedia or textbook does)

While these things could certainly be improved through editing, I just am not sure if the article is worth the effort, because it:

• Seems (to me) to be one person's thesis or essay on an obscure subject
• Does not appear to make any assertion that the subject is notable

I also note from the article history that it was penned by a single-purpose account, whom several other editors have suggested is likely the fringe theorist who wrote part (one chapter) of one of the books listed in the references section, which is extensively referred-to in the article. As such, the article may serve as a self-promotional piece. Do you agree? Any suggestion on how to proceed? Thanks for your time. Jerry delusional ¤ kangaroo 22:43, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

As you say there are two questions: whether the subject is worth an article, and whether this article is satisfactory. First,. as the article says, the term has been used in different ways. The historiographic concept is not obscure or fringe in any sense: its principal proponent is in the Académie française. . Personally, I my first impression is to see this as an apparent example of European theorizing in which words are deliberately used other than in their common meaning--I think the ordinary definitions of " history" and "memory" are exactly opposite to the definitions here. However, I have not read Nora's work; his bio in Wikipedia lists an accessible article on it in the major US history journal , and reading it would seem the obvious place to start, if one decides to have the patience to try to understand it.

The "embodied memory" concept is I think mainstream, and since there are academic publications on it by several authors, it too cannot be considered fringe or obscure. (In fact, unlike the historiographic, it even makes a certain amount of sense to me. I think it is explained fairly well by the short article in the German Wikipedia; the Dutch one may also be helpful, but i cannot do more than guess at the contents.) The importance of Stewart's use of the term is unfamiliar to me, but she is clearly a major author, with multiple books from a major university press.[1]; I therefore cannot see how her work can be called fringe or obscure either.

More generally, a Wikipedia article need not say "this is notable because it is covered in several academic papers", it just has to show that it is discussed by them and the references seem fully sufficient to show that. Most of the contents of an encyclopedia like ours can be expected to be obscure--to provide information is why comprehensive reference works are written. No subject is too technical to be covered, if it is explained properly--properly means so that those people who are likely to be interested in the subject can understand the article. As for me, I have little interest in theoretical cultural studies or current historiography, and I am therefore unwilling to judge by the fact that I cannot understand parts of the article.

But I can judge enough to see that the present article has major deficiencies, and I agree with your analysis of them. Yes, much of the article has been written by an author with COI, & it is therefore a fair question how much it reflects that person's views. The article needs inline citations (not all articles do, but a discussion like this one cannot be supported by merely general references), It is definitely written as an essay, making generalizations & evaluations to an extent that is not appropriate to an encyclopedia, certainly lacks clarity, and does need a better lede paragraph: it therefore needs to be rewritten completely by someone who understands the subject. I would suggest that the first steps would be an article on Stewart, and expansion of the article on Nora based on the one in the French Wikipedia . An approach by author often clarifies things. DGG ( talk ) 02:36, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

The concept of "cultural memory" or "kulturelles Gedächtnis" draws heavily on ideas of Ernest Renan, Maurice Halbwachs, Pierre Nora, Dan Diner and the more constructivist historians of nationalism, e.g. Benedict Anderson, Eric Hobsbawn and Ernest Gellner. I guess one problem is a lack of translation: while it is one of the most frequently refered to concepts in German and French Social Anthropology, Literary Criticism and History, it seems to be not established at all in the english-speaking scientific community. Maybe this is due to a specific German approach in the said academic fields, related to the Holocaust. The concept of "cultural memory" has been developed to a large extent on studying cultural modes of memory and remembrance in regard to the Holocaust: in what way does trauma, pain, guilt etc effect the production of identity and memory both on individual and collective (c.f. Halbwachs) basis. So there is no doubt on the relevance of said concept, but it is definitely a European (maybe even German/French) approach. The term "kulturelles Gedächtnis" has been coined by Jan Assmann and even though it is not without being contested (due to the ambivalence of the concept of "culture"), it is well established and used frequently. Important German academics who are related to said concept are Jan & Aleida Assmann, Doris Bachmann-Medick, Harald Welzer, Günter Oesterle, just to name a few. --Billy pilgrim (talk) 11:19, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Susan Stewart

This article has a reference to Susan Stewart. Is this writer the same as Susan Stewart (poet)? Worldcat and the Library of Congress have references to "Stewart, Susan (Susan A.) 1952-", so the year of birth matches. If you are sure that they are the same people, please change the link from Susan Stewart to Susan Stewart (poet). -- Eastmain (talk) 04:21, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Pierre Nora on Memory and History

The article states the following

"Crucial in understanding cultural memory as a phenomenon is the distinction between memory and history. This distinction was put forward by Pierre Nora, who pinpointed a niche in-between history and memory. Simply put, memories are the events that actually happened, while histories are subjective representations of what historians believe is crucial to remember. This dichotomy, it should be noted, emerged at a particular moment in history: it implies that there used to be a time when memories could exist as such — without being representational."

I am quite certain this is false. Nora discusses the difference in his programmatic essay "Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Mémoire", but as far as I remember the argument does not correspond to the representation above. The essay can be found online [[2]], so this can probably be checked soon. 95.157.3.4 (talk) 22:55, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

It's already on the second page:

"Memory and history, far from being synonymous, appear now to be in fundamental opposition. Memory is life, borne by living societies founded in its name. It remains in permanent evolution, open to the dialectic of remembering and forgetting, unconscious of its successive deformations, vulnerable to manipulation and appropriation, susceptible to being long dormant and periodically revived. History, on the other hand, is the reconstruction, always problematic and incomplete, of what is no longer. Memory is a perpetually actual phenomenon, a bond tying us to the eternal present; history is a representation of the past. Memory, insofar as it is affective and magical, only accommodates those facts that suit it; it nourishes recollections that may be out of focus or telescopic, global or detached, particular or symbolic-responsive to each avenue of conveyance or phenomenal screen, to every censorship or projection. History, because it is an intellectual and secular production, calls for analysis and criticism. Memory installs remembrance within the sacred; history, always prosaic, releases it again. Memory is blind to all but the group it binds-which is to say, as Maurice Halbwachs has said, that there are as many memories as there are groups, that memory is by nature multiple and yet specific; collective, plural, and yet individual. History, on the other hand, belongs to everyone and to no one, whence its claim to universal authority. Memory takes root in the concrete, in spaces, gestures, images, and objects; history binds itself strictly to temporal continuities, to progressions and to relations between things. Memory is absolute, while history can only conceive the relative."

Nora does not define the difference as between one adhering to the actual facts or being true and the other being merely subjective. He does not seem to judge one to be true or false. And the article actually gets the subjectivity wrong. Because memory for Nora is living, organic, evolving and connected to identity, it is memory which is subjective. His argument in the following is that because history is critical and universal, it aims at the dissolution of memory. I will reread the whole essay and propose a text representing it better. But just as the article on collective memory, much work has to be done to bring it up to par. 95.157.3.4 (talk) 23:03, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

New link

I've added a link to the wiki page for the journal Memory Studies, a peer-reviewed academic journal relating to the subject of Cultural Memory. T.Broch (talk) 13:56, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Eurocentric

This article is remarkably Eurocentric. Please correct. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 180.222.165.93 (talk) 00:18, 1 May 2017 (UTC)

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Studies

Hi all! Let me first state that I have not been involved in the creating or editing of this article, but I stumbled across it while doing reseacrh for my thesis. I did just now add some tags to indicate that these sentence need referencing.

However, under the section 'Studies' the text on the MA programme seems irrelevant to me. Especially because of its focus on London it risks becoming eurocentric. Multiple universities across multiple continents have studies on memory. These are now underrepresented by the focus on London. My suggestion would therefore be to delete this section. What do you think? RafaëllaMES (talk) 10:44, 19 February 2021 (UTC)