Cultural Memory in Literature

A memory in most cases is identified as something that has happened in the past. Memory is very important as it connects the past, the present and the future. Every memory is very important to define the present and also the future. The cultural memory is basically a concept of the physical dimension of the human memory. With this ideology, cultural memory can be defined according to various forms identically the memory culture and a past reference (Assmann, 2011). The memory culture is generally a way in which the society ensures that there is the continuity of the culture through the preservation of it with the assistance of the cultural knowledge from generation to generation. A reference to the past is what reassures a society and its members that their collective ideologies and in a way give them an awareness of their unity in both time and space.

Cultural memory can identically be used to note the collective construction of the distant past as it is understood by some people in a provided historical and social context (Assmann, 2011). Cultural memory in some cultures can be identified as the past or the history that is created in a given society at certain occasions whether it is of the old times such as the ancient Mesopotamia or during and festivities like the celebration of independence in the American world. In literature, the past can be formulated in various forms and specifically in very diverse forms (Rivkin & Ryan, 2017). Cultural memory is very important as it is an umbrella of describing the different and complex methods which the society believes.

Assmann differentiates the two terminologies of communal memory which is a shared memory that involves two people. Communicative type of memory, in general, goes in for about over eighty years back and it is a group of events which only fewer people can recall (Rivkin & Ryan, 2017). For example, the bombing that happened in Pearl Harbor is a type of a communicative memory since only fewer people can remember about it. The assassinations of Martin Luther King and another John F. Kennedy and many other happenings are typically an example of the communicative memory. Today in literature we learn about this two famous people in the actual sense not because anyone alive today interacted with them but because the memory of the past is still fresh day in day out and generations to come will hear of it also. This is important since it is a cultural memory that allows us to identify such happenings thereby enabling us to transfer the same to our communities. In some ways, cultural memory is only important in explaining the events of the past but in the real world, it is important in giving guidance to the future (Assmann, 2011). The records established by such great individuals helps in moving the society forward and in different ways. In the United States, cultural memory is approached using the stories given during the first Thanksgiving.

There are other ways in which culture is transmitted using literature like in the biblical accounts in which the Jewish escaped from Egypt for the second book in the Bible. The Cultural memory of certain occasions such as the Holocaust is also indicated in the works done by Levi and Frankl (Rivkin & Ryan, 2017). Both individuals are camp survivors who will forever be influential from the past more than 80 years and this is all with the help of cultural memory.

 

 

 

 

References

Assmann, J. (2011). Communicative and cultural memory. In Cultural Memories (pp. 15-27). Springer Netherlands.

Rivkin, J., & Ryan, M. (2017). Literary theory: an anthology. John Wiley & Sons.