1. “How Societies Remember” By Paul Connerton
Presentation by:
Amy Milligan &
Ron Gorda

2. Earlier Research on Memory
Inscribed Texts and Traditions
Individual Memory Study
Social Memory Study

3. Memory Reliance
Personal Memory
Cognitive Memory
Habit Memory

4. Connerton and Memory Cultural not individual process
Incorporated rather than inscribed
Defines culture
Establishes order
Perpetuates and sustains the culture

5. Memory & Time Interconnection between past and present
Both are interdependent
Establishes patterns of perception and behavior

6. Memory and Society Connects inhabitants of a society
Defines the societies purpose
Establish social order within that society
Becomes its’ history, usually through replacement
Past dictates present perceptions and actions
Sustains society through repetition and transmission
Can be revised over time

7. Exemplephied by:
Rituals or ceremonies
Bodily practices

8. Historic Examples French Revolution Third Reich Religion
Rituals – Public Events
Bodily Practices – Fashions
Third Reich
Religion
Jews
Christians
Muslims

9. French Revolution Rituals - Public Events

10. French Revolution Bodily Practices - Fashions

11. Social and Political Research
Maurice Halbwachs
Maurice Bloch
R.A. Rappaport
David Efron
Thomas Mann

12. Social and Political Research
M. Oakeshot
Marcel Proust
M. Sahlins
P. Winch
D. Sudnow

13. Correlation to Knowledge Structures
People as Knowledge Structures through the study of:
Inscribed Texts and Traditions
People
Rituals and Ceremonies
Bodily Practices
Can then Derive:
Group
Culture, Social Structure and Politics
Motivations or Actions
Logic

14. Reviews
Adams, V. (1990). How Societies Remember (review). Sociological Review, 38,
Separates habit, cognitive and social memory.
Dismisses anthropological research on habits and bodily practices
Kumar, K. (1990). How Societies Remember (review). Sociology, 24,
Loose ends
Bodily practices & habit memory importance

15. Question 1
How do these principals apply to our past treatment of the American Indian?

16. Question 2
How do these principals apply to cults and other radical groups?

17. Question 3
Do you feel that your personal actions are based upon Connerton’s observations? What is based on Social Memory? What is based on Individual Memory?

18. Question 4
Can you think of other examples of habit memory that may perpetuate social memory?

19. Question 5
Do you agree that the form of a ritual or ceremony is more important than the content?

20. Question 5
If social memory is plastic and changeable, then what is being perpetuated by habit memory? Is it only the feeling of community and connection to the larger group?