The role of cultural memory in construction of collective identity

UDC 177+316

https://doi.org/10.20339/AM.01-21.015

L.I. Sedova is PhD student, Senior Lecturer at Bauman Moscow State Technical University e-mail: lyubovmiklina@yandex.ru

Analyzed are collective identification processes that occur in conjunction with complicated, contradictory processes of glocalization, cultural exchange, emancipation of minorities, national liberation movements, etc. The paper aims to study the collective identity construction in the modern society, using the framework of cultural memory. Links between collective memory and collective identity are theoretically considered; the methodology of “imagined communities” is proposed to explore the collective memory as a resource of social integration. The article argues that the nation state is no longer the dominant basis for identity. Nowadays collectives require a shared memory of the past as the basis for social identity. The paper focuses on a high symbolic value of a remembering history, especially of a cultural trauma. The culturally constructed trauma can appear on the level of groups, and provide integration of community, based on victimization of the past. Thus, the collective traumatic memory can develop a negative collective identity, based on common traumatic experiences. Viewed from “imagined communities” perspective, social trauma is a part of politics of memory that becomes the politics of identity. Using results of sociological research, we distinguish three different versions of memorial paradigm, i.e. oblivion, displacement, and evocation. Such differentiation allows to argue that communities could manage their collective memory as a resource of social identification, and consequently integration.

Key words: collective identity, collective memory, cultural memory, “imagined communities”, cultural trauma, victimization of the past, politics of memory, politics of identity.

References

1. Robertson, R. Glocalization: Time-Space and Homogenity-Heterogenity. In: Global Modernities. London, New Delhi, 1995. P. 25–44.
2. Fedotova, N.N. Multiculturalism and Development Policy. Journal of Sociology and Social Anthropology. 2006. Vol. IX. No. 3. P. 78.
3. Fedotova, N.N. Multiculturalism and Development Policy. Journal of Sociology and Social Anthropology. 2006. Vol. IX. No. 3. P. 83.
4. Erikson, E. Identity: Youth and Crisis. London, 1974. P. 273.
5. Malygina, I.V. Ethnocultural Identity: Ontology, Morphology, Dynamics: аbstr. diss. ... dr. of philosophy sciences. Moscow, 2005. P. 16–17.
6. Malygina, I.V. Ethnocultural Identity: Ontology, Morphology, Dynamics: аbstr. diss. ... dr. of philosophy sciences. Moscow, 2005. P. 42.
7. Huntington, S. Who are we: The Challenges to America’s National Identity. Moscow: AST, 2018. P. 52.
8. Anderson, B. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Moscow: Kuchkovo pole, 2016. P. 47.
9. Berger, P., Luckmann, T. Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge. Moscow: Mos. Philos. fund, 1995.
10. Anderson, B. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Moscow: Kuchkovo pole, 2016. P. 75.
11. Huntington S. Who are we: The Challenges to America’s National Identity. Moscow: AST, 2018.
12. Nora, P. Between Memory and History. Les Lieux de Mémoire. In: France-memory. St. Petersburg: University Publishing House, 1999. P. 18.
13. Halbwachs, M. Social Framework of Memory. Moscow: Novoe Izdatelstvo, 2007.
14. Halbwachs, M. Collective and Historical Memory. NZ Journal. 2005. No. 2-3. P. 30.
15. Nora, P. Between Memory and History. Les Lieux de Mémoire. In: France-memory. St. Petersburg: University Publishing House, 1999. P. 78.
16. Bauman, Z. Identity: Conversations with Benedetto Vecchi. Cambridge, UK; Malden, MA: Polity Press, 2004.
17. Assmann, J. Cultural Memory: Letter, Memory of the Past and Political Identity in the High Cultures of Antiquity. Moscow: Languages of Slavic Culture, 2004. P. 55.
18. Nora, P. Disorder of Historical Identity. Russian Electronic Journal “World of History”. 2001. No. 1. URL: http://www.historia.ru/2010/01/nora.htm  (accesses on 10/14/2020).
19. Bagdasaryan, N.G. The Politics of Memory: The Past as a Product of Interpretation. Materials of the International Scientific Conference “Philosophy of Revolutions and Global Trends of Our Time”. Dubna, 2017. P. 5–17.
20. Gigauri, D.I. The Politics of Memory in the Practice of the Social Construction of Political Identity. Historical, Philosophical, Political and Legal sciences, Cultural Studies and Arts. Questions of theory and practice. Tambov: Gramota, 2015. No. 10 (60). Part I. P. 60.
21. Alexander, D. Cultural Trauma and Collective Identity. Sociological Journal. 2012. No. 3. P. 17.
22. Malygina, I.V. The Identification Function of Cultural Memory: From “Remembering Culture” to the “Culture of Oblivion”. Culture and Education. 2013. No. 1 (10). P. 44.
23. Assmann, J. Cultural Memory: Letter, Memory of the Past and Political Identity in the High Cultures of Antiquity. Moscow: Languages of Slavic Culture, 2004. P. 23.
24. Miklina, L.I. Social Memory of Modern Russian Youth. Vlast. 2015. No. 1. P. 136–140.