ABSTRACT
This section highlights and integrates the multidisciplinary theory and research on organizational memory (Casey, 1997; Walsh & Ungson, 1991) and collective memory (Fine & Beim, 2007; Olick, 2007; Olick & Robbins, 1998; Schwartz, 1991a, 1991b, 1997, 2000, 2005; Wertsch, 2002, 2008) and their relationship to organizational identity (Albert & Whetten, 1985; Casey & Byington, 2013) and national and cultural identity (Hall, 1996; Kelman, 1997, 2001; Schwartz, 2000, 2005; Zerubavel, 2003). Collective memory is a significant research focus in the social sciences, as interest in it has grown across disciplines (Espinoza, Piper, & Fernandez, 2014; Loveday, 2014; Radstone, 2000). As this focus has emerged, the relationship between collective memory and identity itself has also surfaced as a topic for theory and research. Similarly, the interest in organizational and national or cultural identity has continued to grow and is a significant research focus. In this literature, the importance of memory to identity has been theorized and researched, as highlighted by Olick, Vinitzky-Seroussi, and Levy (2011) in their question, “How is the self of yesterday connected to the self of today and of tomorrow? Only by memory?” (p. 177). Although this quote is primarily referring to the individual level of analysis, it can also be theorized at the collective level and across levels and highlights the critical importance of memory in forming identity, particularly memory in the form of an organized narrative from birth or founding to death (Olick et al., 2011) of an individual or a collective. Individuals and groups are linked through the stories they tell (Olick et al., 2011) and collective identity is created, sustained, and at times evolves as it in turn influences what is recalled and why. Halbwachs’s (1980) work serves as a foundation for the relationship between identity and memory and the importance of shared memories and commemoration to a collective’s identity process.
