Abstract
When the first edition of Memory Studies was published in January 2008, Jeffrey Olick, one of the three editors of the strongly revised text collection reviewed here, already advocated the canonization and systematizing of the field for which he introduced the term ‘social memory studies’. Since one essential challenge inherent in this field of study surfaces not only in the introduction but also in the collection of texts, the Collective Memory Reader shows how difficult and possibly also futile such an undertaking may be: many disciplines approach the topic differently so that, on the one side, various terms and methodologies bear the potential to describe and understand remembrance and memory as an operation fundamental to human existence. Ideally, an exchange between the various disciplines, schools and modes of thinking could therefore be initiated that would focus on the object of investigation and aim at a comprehensive understanding of the phenomenon. On the other side, everyday experience first illustrates that transdisciplinary modes of thinking or research are actually a rarity – although they are possible and even necessary. Second, it uncovers just how strongly the prevalent discourse in the respective disciplines focuses on only a handful of approaches associated with specific actors. Accordingly, the task the editors set themselves when compiling the reader and – as far as I can see – also their aspiration is complicated. Nothing else is at stake but the realization of the aim to mark off the boundaries of a vast, confusing and only hazily delineated field of investigation in its disciplinary width and historical depth by presenting excerpts with an average length of two to five pages. What is more, the editors and notably Olick who, it seems to me, wrote large parts of the introduction, want to reach one if not more objectives: In the spirit of enlightenment they want to set straight a ‘misleading narrative’ on the origins of the field (p. 5), as regards science policy their goal is to ‘help [to] consolidate the future of this still-developing and … crucially important field of inquiry (p. 6) and, last but not least, they delve into identity negotiation by creating ‘a life-story for [not ‘of’, CG] the field’ (p. 48).
With reference to the historical dimension, the editors (and this takes up considerable room) wish to put into proportion the relevancy of Maurice Halbwachs as the founding father of investigations into the ‘Mémoire Collective’ – this is how they think he is received by the audience. This has the curious effect that Halbwachs is extensively discussed, his text the longest in the reader and his name the one listed most often in the register. Therefore – and this is my assumption in line with the insights of Tradierungsforschung – they probably confirm his status; the beginning of this paragraph might be considered a first empirical proof. Even less convincing is the attempt to belittle the so-called memory boom that has been on the rise since the 1980s. Certainly and as the editors impressively illustrate, ‘collective memory’ has long been an issue and some of the classic texts dealing with the issue are considerably older than 1980. It is, however, possible to talk of a boom that shows when quantitative measures are applied and one cares to take a look at the continuously rising number of institutions, journals, courses of study (including those resulting from processes of renaming – especially in these ‘profligate uses’, which the editors justly criticize, the boom becomes apparent), publications and conferences. In addition, remembrance and memory are currently as much paradigmatic concepts as they are fashionable terms, especially in the Kulturwissenschaften. Yet, all in all and in light of the strengths of the reader these weaknesses fade to light irritations. Even if not everybody will want to comply with all theses proposed by the editors, the compilation is proof of an impressive knowledge of literature that shows, for example, in the ambitious, sweeping gesture to historicize the field by compiling an adequate range of texts.
Reading the texts is a pleasure and, more importantly, never boring because the editors were guided by different and not always easily reconcilable considerations. In this way, they have compiled a reader for their English-speaking (academic) audience that comprises texts of authors that are not widely acknowledged in the field of memory studies (e.g. de Tocqueville, Marx, Foucault); that go back to the beginnings of modernity (Burke); that exclude some of the (especially premodern) usual suspects (e. g. Augustinus), but not others (e.g. Halbwachs, Nora, Hobsbawm); that cover a wide range of thematic fields (e.g. epistemology, media research, Tradierungsforschung, reflections on the relation between history and remembrance, etc.); that introduce a series of more or less established terms (e.g. Gross’s non-contemporaneity or Alexander’s carrier groups); that present French and German authors, i.e. texts that are little known especially in the USA; and that introduce a number of US-American authors that have been little received by the European audience and that so far have, at least to me, been unknown.
My initial skepticism in view of the sampling strategy – the excerpts are, as has been mentioned, not only short but in some cases have also been considerably edited – waned in the process of reading. The fear that contexts might be lost and interpretations evoked that do not pay justice to the originals is rebutted already by the introductions to the texts (the longest of which, by the way, once again is devoted to Halbwachs). However, much more important appeared to be the overall design of the compilation: if not read like a handbook, i.e. as is required for a specific purpose, but more conventionally from cover to back, the panorama of a multi-layered analysis of a phenomenon emerges that, in its basic meaning for sociality and culture, up to the present day has not been adequately recognized. As objects of research, remembrance and memory gain whenever they are investigated and understood in terms of their function for basic human activities: to put oneself into relation to either oneself, the environment, humanity, etc. Then it also becomes clear that remembrance is not merely of an episodic or semantic nature, but that – beyond history and stories – it may be understood as a kind of formation and passing on of individual and collective experiences. In this case, it is appropriate to speak of ‘sedimented experiences’. These traces of the past, which often exist beyond narrative structures, for a long time have been captured in a multitude of different concepts. In the reader, for example, Freud’s concept of the ‘inheritance of psychic dispositions’ (p. 84), Connerton’s reference to ‘habitual memory sedimented in the body’ (p. 342) or Lipsitz’s ‘sedimented historical currents’ (p. 342) are mentioned. The term identity, for which the act of putting oneself into relation is constitutive, is anyway omnipresent. The list could be continued beyond the limits of the compilation, citing, amongst others, mentality, mental models, habitus or even figuration. To me it seems as if one of the most interesting theoretical challenges of the future is made possible by an extensive reception of the texts introduced in the reader, namely the systematic connection of memory studies with such concepts. In this context, the complementary consideration of social scientific action theories (next to Mead, who is covered by the reader, Parsons, Bandura, Esser or Joas would be possible candidates), which are not adequately represented in the compilation, is indispensable because action theories often (though not exclusively) implicitly address the relationship between experience, requirements of the situation and horizons of expectation and, therewith, the relationship between past, present and future. Accordingly, they cover features central to theories of memory and remembrance such as perception, interpretation, reproduction, imagination and projection. Even if I believe that the intention of the book to pursue the formation of a tradition is debatable, I can only recommend it to everybody (if only remotely) associated with this area of research, not to mention to everybody using it for purposes of instruction.