A traumatic memory: how to study and to interpret it

Abstract

A review of the contemporary studies of traumatic memory and its interpretation is carried out. The investigations of the prominent specialists (J. Alexander, A. Assman, J. Wertsch, C. Caruth, D. LaCapra, J. Rusen, P. Hutton, and the like) are analyzed to demonstrate a complexity of this sort of studies which show that a collective trauma causes different outcomes in different contexts. A relevance of these approaches to the Russian case is discussed. A social memory has a special shape in case of a collective trauma. If the latter is a result of a terrible catastrophe, it leaves a deep scar in a social consciousness. The result is either a narrative or a silence. A traumatic memory is heterogeneous: firstly, it leaves different traces in various groups (social, generational, gender, ethnic, racial, religious) and various nations, and secondly, it contains different interpretations and evaluations dependent on social experience and purposes of particular individuals. As a fact of a collective reflection a trauma causes strong emotions and is based on a number of symbols which are used by both an imagination and a social practice. A clash of radically different views sometimes brings about conflicts. In some cases a traumatic memory is institutionalized by an establishment of commissions for investigation of the crimes and a restoration of justice, an erection of the monuments for the victims, a foundation of the museums, an introduction of the Days of sorrow, and an organization of rituals and ceremonies. There are special methods to treat trauma. But sometimes a society itself does not want to part with it because a victimization lets one claim a compensation or certain social privilages. Evidently, this trend comes to be popular in contemporary Russia.