Constructing Social Memory

This book is about the role of memory in contemporary social sciences and societies.

The work has two parts. In the first, experts from different countries address the topic of memory from a theoretical and epistemological perspective: e.g. historical memory, biographical memory, memory as an act of creation, as well as and the narrative dimension of memory. In the second part, case studies are presented, from different countries (France, Italy, Albania, Spain, Brazil, Peru among others) referring to the relationship between memories and aspects of social life, such as migration, conflict, gender relations, journalism and public opinion, culture, collective trauma, art, collaborative archaeology, and the use of film materials.

The book has both a political and a methodological intent. It underlines how the circulation of conflicting and unresolved narratives of past events may take multiple forms through a wide range of communicative, aesthetic and cultural codes. The empirical contributions deal with traumatic, silenced, stubborn, and insurgent memories, whose narration is able to have an impact on present and future. Thus, each chapter is an attempt to give back the right to speak to people and stories often placed on the margins of dominant narratives.

Constructing Social Memory introduces insights and themes of study that embrace a multiplicity of approaches to memory, and makes a wholly original contribution to the topic.