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“How Societies Remember” By Paul Connerton. Presentation by: Amy Milligan & Ron Gorda. Earlier Research on Memory. Inscribed Texts and Traditions Individual Memory Study Social Memory Study. Memory Reliance. Personal Memory Cognitive Memory Habit Memory. Connerton and Memory.
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“How Societies Remember”By Paul Connerton Presentation by: Amy Milligan & Ron Gorda
Earlier Research on Memory • Inscribed Texts and Traditions • Individual Memory Study • Social Memory Study
Memory Reliance • Personal Memory • Cognitive Memory • Habit Memory
Connerton and Memory • Cultural not individual process • Incorporated rather than inscribed • Defines culture • Establishes order • Perpetuates and sustains the culture
Memory & Time • Interconnection between past and present • Both are interdependent • Establishes patterns of perception and behavior
Memory and Society • Connects inhabitants of a society • Defines the societies purpose • Establish social order within that society • Becomes its’ history, usually through replacement • Past dictates present perceptions and actions • Sustains society through repetition and transmission • Can be revised over time
Exemplephied by: • Rituals or ceremonies • Bodily practices
Historic Examples • French Revolution • Rituals – Public Events • Bodily Practices – Fashions • Third Reich • Religion • Jews • Christians • Muslims
Social and Political Research • Maurice Halbwachs • Maurice Bloch • R.A. Rappaport • David Efron • Thomas Mann
Social and Political Research • M. Oakeshot • Marcel Proust • M. Sahlins • P. Winch • D. Sudnow
Correlation to Knowledge Structures • People as Knowledge Structures through the study of: • Inscribed Texts and Traditions • People • Rituals and Ceremonies • Bodily Practices • Can then Derive: • Group • Culture, Social Structure and Politics • Motivations or Actions • Logic
Reviews • Adams, V. (1990). How Societies Remember (review). Sociological Review, 38, 790-794. • Separates habit, cognitive and social memory. • Dismisses anthropological research on habits and bodily practices • Kumar, K. (1990). How Societies Remember (review). Sociology, 24, 568-569. • Loose ends • Bodily practices & habit memory importance
Question 1 • How do these principals apply to our past treatment of the American Indian?
Question 2 • How do these principals apply to cults and other radical groups?
Question 3 • Do you feel that your personal actions are based upon Connerton’s observations? What is based on Social Memory? What is based on Individual Memory?
Question 4 • Can you think of other examples of habit memory that may perpetuate social memory?
Question 5 • Do you agree that the form of a ritual or ceremony is more important than the content?
Question 5 • If social memory is plastic and changeable, then what is being perpetuated by habit memory? Is it only the feeling of community and connection to the larger group?