Cultural Memory Studies: An International and Interdisciplinary Handbook

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Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2008. — viii, 441 p. — ISBN 978-3-11-018860-8.This handbook represents the interdisciplinary and international field of “cultural memory studies” for the first time in one volume. Articles by renowned international scholars offer readers a unique overview of the key concepts of cultural memory studies. The handbook not only documents current research in an unprecedented way; it also serves as a forum for bringing together approaches from areas as varied as sociology, political sciences, history, theology, literary studies, media studies, philosophy, psychology, and neurosciences. “Cultural memory studies” – as defined in this handbook – came into being at the beginning of the 20th century, with the works of Maurice Halbwachs on mémoire collective. In the course of the last two decades this area of research has witnessed a veritable boom in various countries and disciplines. As a consequence, the study of the relation of “culture” and “memory” has diversified into a wide range of approaches. This handbook is based on a broad understanding of “cultural memory” as the interplay of present and past in sociocultural contexts. It presents concepts for the study of individual remembering in a social context, group and family memory, national memory, the various media of memory, and finally the host of emerging transnational lieux de mémoire such as 9/11.Cultural Memory Studies: An IntroductionLoci memoriae—Lieux de memoireItalian luoghi della memoriaMitteleuropa as a lieu de memoireSites of Memory in U.S.-American Histories and CulturesSites of Memory and the Shadow of WarMemory and the History of MentalitiesThe Invention of Cultural MemoryCanon and ArchiveCommunicative and Cultural MemoryGeneration/Generationality, Generativity, and MemoryCultural Memory: A European PerspectiveMaurice Halbwachs's memoire collectiveFrom Collective Memory to the Sociology of Mnemonic Practices andProductsMemory in Post-Authoritarian SocietiesMemory and PoliticsSocial Forgetting: A Systems-Theory ApproachMemory and Remembrance: A Constructivist ApproachMemory and Forgetting in Paul Ricoeur's Theory ofthe Capable SelfPsychology, Narrative, and Cultural Memory: Past and PresentAgainst the Concept of Cultural TraumaExperience and Memory: Imaginary Futures in the PastA Cognitive Taxonomy of Collective MemoriesLanguage and Memory: Social and Cognitive ProcessesCultural Memory and the NeurosciencesCommunicative MemoryMnemonic and Intertextual Aspects of LiteratureCultural Memory and the Literary CanonLife-Writing, Cultural Memory, and Literary StudiesThe Literary Representation of MemoryThe Dynamics of Remembrance: Texts Between Monumentality and MorphingThe Texture of Memory: Holocaust Memorials in HistoryThe Photograph as Externalization and TraceJournalism's Memory WorkLiterature, Film, and the Mediality of Cultural MemoryMemory and Media Cultures