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»Formen und Funktionen sozialer Gedächtnisse - Sozial- und kulturwissenschaftliche Perspektiven«

• Call for Abstracts:
  
  Social Memories: Form and Functions
  Following up on the conference “Forms and Functions of Social Memories: Perspectives from Social and Cultural Sciences” organized at the University of Erlangen in December 2010, we wish to invite articles for the forthcoming volume on “Social Memories: Form and Functions” which is being planned either as a special issue of the journal Memory Studies or as an independent text to be brought out by a reputed publisher. The proposed volume seeks to deepen the focus of the Erlangen conference on the examination as well as integration of theoretical approaches in the field of social memory studies.
  
  In the recent self-descriptions of modernity, older grand narratives of the past have been replaced with a multiplicity of social memories that coexist on different levels without necessarily being compatible with one another. Moreover, contemporary analyses of social memories focus either on group-memories which are constituted through interactions or on higher-order forms of memories, such as systems, discourses, organizations, nations etc., without determining the specificity of the different levels and without adequately clarifying the intersections and interactions between the respective forms. Thus, a theory of social memories is confronted with the task of incorporating processes of social differentiation as well as of cultural plurality without discounting the specific sites of interaction, such as family and milieu. However, the point is not to simply juxtapose the current concepts and definitions of the forms of social memories; instead, we wish to address, with the aid of both theoretical and empirical investigations, the underlying processes of formation and constitution in order to analyze not only the points of dispute but also the potential for reconciliation between the differing conceptions.
  
  The constructions and representations of the past could be viewed as performative acts, sites of narrative interaction or even as discourses, in order to address the problematics of social forgetting, authenticity, facticity, validity or radical breach with tradition. On the one hand, this should clarify the future-orientedness of social memories in terms of their form as the ever again newly constituting horizons of expectations. On the other, it is necessary to analyze social memories in terms of their function as mechanisms of transmission pertaining to the specific resonances which emerge at the interfaces, for instance, between persons, groups, generations or discourses, and which constitute a specific relation between remembering and forgetting. It is equally significant to determine the respective functions of memories for the processes of social and individual construction of meaning, be it in biographical or systemic respect. This is further complicated by one’s own embroilment in the site of one’s utterance as also in the institutionalized modes of remembering. Academicians are directly or indirectly involved in the practices of (institutionalized) remembering and therefore are themselves faced with the task of interrogating their contexts, conditions, (political) aims and the implicit ideologies. Thus, the proposed volume seeks to present theoretical conceptions and empirical research regarding social memories in an interdisciplinary and self-reflexive framework and elicits on this basis contributions that advance the existing theoretical insights.
  
  The abstracts (not more than 500 words) of your articles should be submitted by 15th July 2011, and completed articles should be submitted on or before 31st December 2011.
  As there will be double-blinded reviews, please submit your main manuscript and title page as separate files. Moreover, please avoid any references in the main text that might reveal your identity to the reviewer.

• Book Announcement:
  
  "The Collective Memory Reader" Edited by Jeffrey K. Olick, Vered Vinitzky-Seroussi and Daniel Levy (Oxford University Press, 2011)
  
  Description In the last few decades, there are few concepts that have rivaled "collective memory" for attention in the humanities and social sciences. Indeed, use of the term has extended far beyond scholarship to the realm of politics and journalism, where it has appeared in speeches at the centers of power and on the front pages of the world's leading newspapers. Seen by scholars in numerous fields as a hallmark characteristic of our age, an idea crucial for understanding our present social, political, and cultural conditions, collective memory now guides inquiries into diverse, though connected, phenomena. Nevertheless, there remains a great deal of confusion about the meaning, origin, and implication of the term and the field of inquiry it underwrites.
  
  The Collective Memory Reader presents, organizes, and evaluates past work and contemporary contributions on collective memory. Combining seminal texts, hard-to-find classics, previously untranslated references, and contemporary landmarks, it will serve as a key reference in the field. In addition to a thorough introduction, which outlines a useful past for contemporary memory studies, The Collective Memory Reader includes five sections-Precursors and Classics; History, Memory, and Identity; Power, Politics, and Contestation; Media and Modes of Transmission; Memory, Justice, and the Contemporary Epoch-comprising ninety-one texts. A short editorial essay introduces each of the sections, while brief capsules frame each of the selected texts.
  
  An indispensable guide, The Collective Memory Reader is at once a definitive entry point into the field for students and an essential resource for scholars.
  
  Features - The first and only comprehensive, foundational overview of collective memory.
  - Includes 91 seminal papers, difficult-to-find classics, contemporary landmark contributions, and translations not available anywhere else.
  - Extensive editorial framework, including a substantial introductory essay, shorter essays presenting the organization of materials, and brief descriptions of the import of every selection.
  - Provides not only a definitive entry point into the field for students, but is also an essential resource for scholars already working within it.
  
  
  
• Auf Nachfrage von Takemitsu Morikawa veröffentlichen wir an dieser Stelle den Call for Papers für die internationale und interdisziplinäre Tagung "Semantische Traditionen der Liebe und Ausdiffernzierung der Intimität. Divergenz und Konvergenz im Kulturvergleich" am 07. und 08. Oktober 2011 an der Universität Luzern. CfP