ABSTRACT
This volume suggests a model of collective memory that distinguishes between two conceptual logics of memory fragmentation: vertical fragmentation and horizontal fragmentation. It offers a series of case studies of conflict and post-conflict collective memory, shedding light on the ways various actors participate in the production, dissemination, and contestation of memory discourses.
With attention to the characteristics of both vertical and horizontal memory fragmentation, the book addresses the plurality of diverging, and often conflicting, memory discourses that are produced within the public sphere of a given community. It analyzes the juxtaposition, tensions, and interactions between narratives produced beyond or below the central state, often transcending national boundaries.
The book is structured according to the type of actors involved in a memory fragmentation process. It explores how states have been trying to produce and impose memory discourses on civil societies, sometimes even against the experiences of their own citizens, and how such efforts as well as backlash from actors below and beyond the state have led to horizontal and vertical memory fragmentation. Furthermore, it considers the attempts by states’ representatives to reassert control of national memory discourses and the subsequent resistances they face. As such, this volume will appeal to sociology and political science scholars interested in memory studies in post-conflict societies.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
chapter 1|16 pages
Introduction
part 1|90 pages
Civil society actors
chapter 4|14 pages
Conflict memories and sexual and gender-based violence
chapter 5|14 pages
The Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgräberfürsorge
chapter 6|14 pages
Pluralism at stake
chapter 7|18 pages
The PSG Ultras' annual commemoration of the 13 November 2015 terrorist attacks
part 2|46 pages
Historians
chapter 10|14 pages
When historians contribute to the fragmentation of memories
part 3|70 pages
Soldiers and military organizations
chapter 11|15 pages
Understanding the fragmentation of the memory of the Allied bombings of World War II
chapter 13|18 pages
“Hurra, wir können's noch!”
part 4|38 pages
Transnational organizations