![]() These will not, strictly speaking, be individual since, as Halbwachs affirms, the individual is never alone.ħ I n making memory the subject of the social sciences Halbwachs reiterates Durkheim’s argument on the predominance of collective over individual consciousness. If lost in the same desert, two individuals from different cultural traditions will have different memories, descriptions and feelings associated with their experiences. ![]() Even though the individual may think that their memory is strictly personal, as it recalls events in which only they were involved or facts and objects which only they witnessed and experienced, it is, in fact, collective since the individual, even if alone, is the product of social interactions and views the world through collective constructs such as language. Memory is formed by individuals interacting with each other and by social groups, and individual memories are the result of this process. The individual alone does not have control over recovering the past. Individual memory only reveals the complexities of the social interrelations experienced by each person.Ħ The general merit of Halbwachs’ work, therefore, was to show that individual memory cannot be separated from collective memories. As individuals do not belong only to one group but are involved in multiple social relationships, the individual differences in each memory express the results of each person’s trajectory throughout their lives. Therefore, certain memories are repeated within the family, others among workers in a factory and so on. 1 Rejecting the idea current at the time that memory was the result of the impression of real events on the human mind, he established the thesis that people weave their memories together on the basis of the various forms of interaction that they engage in with other individuals.
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