ABSTRACT
The icon of the ‘Angel of History’ (Klee, Benjamin, Adorno and others) is unravelled. Bloch’s discussion of apocalyptic sensibility and its role in the modern transformation of consciousness in the face of potential nuclear oblivion is related to Klee’s Angelus. In what sense is modern memory ‘modernist’? Given its constructivist nature, does malleability threaten memory by demythologizing, reframing and creating further silences. These open issues of what fills the void: Hobsbawm fears a loss of history, given the past in the present. Weber sees the rationalization process as contributing to this flux, as does Huyssen. But demographics encourage memory growth and globalization of travel. How does making memory relate to our ever-changing images of the present? Personal memory journeys (Joe’s War) suggest the political and existential importance of authentic memory.
What is the role of the journalist-historian as a memory-maker? Or photojournalist or the photograph? Does the ‘present’ blot out the past and can ‘remembering’ be a form of blocking it? The narrative of Khaldei’s Reichstag photo (1945) is assessed. The relation of memory to history, and its role in social change is discussed in the context of postnational transitions.
