Vortrag: "History and Popular Memory: The Power of Story in Moments of Crisis"

When people experience a traumatic event, such as war or the threat of annihilation, they often turn to history for stories that promise a positive outcome to their suffering. During World War II, the French thus took comfort in the story of Joan of Arc and her heroic efforts to rid France of foreign occupation. Yet to bring the Joan narrative more into line with current circumstances, popular retellings of it modified the original story, so that what people believed took place in the past was often quite different from what actually occurred. This interplay between story and history tends to be worldwide in reach, manifesting itself in countries of radically different cultural, religious, and social character. From among the many possible examples, the presentation focuses on Serbia, Israel, the Soviet Union, China, Great Britain, and France, all of which experienced severe crises in the twentieth century and, in response, appropriated age-old historical narratives that resonated with what was happening in the present to serve a unifying, restorative purpose. A central theme is the distinction between popular memory and history. Although vitally important to historians, this distinction is routinely blurred in people’s minds, and the historian’s truth often cannot compete with the power of a compelling story out of the past, even when − or precisely because − the latter has been seriously distorted by myth or political manipulation. Patterns of interaction, given their near-universality, may well be rooted in certain human propensities that transcend cultural difference.

 

Zur Person:

Paul A. Cohen is Wasserman Professor of Asian Studies and History Emeritus at Wellesley College and a long-time associate of the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University. Professor Cohen followed the invitation to visit the Seminar of East Asian Studies expressed by Klaus Mühlhahn, Professor of Chinese History and Culture at Freie Universität Berlin.

Ort: Center for Area Studies (CAS), Hauptgebäude des SFB 700, Binger Straße 40, 14197 Berlin

Zeit: Dienstag, den 17. Juni 2014, 16.00 Uhr s.t.

Die Veranstaltung wird moderiert von Frau Prof. Dr. Verena Blechinger-Talcott und begleitet von Herrn Prof. Dr. Rinke, der im Anschluss an den Vortrag als Discussant auftreten wird.

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