Collective Memory as Currency : : The Dominance of the Past in the Present / / Tracy Adams.

• VerfasserIn: Adams, Tracy,
• Place / Publishing House: Berlin ;, Boston : : De Gruyter, , [2024]; 2024
• Year of Publication: 2024
• Language: English
• Series: De Gruyter Contemporary Social Sciences , 32
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (X, 125 p.)
• Other title: Frontmatter --; Contents --; Chapter One Theorizing Collective Memory as Currency --; Chapter Two Holocaust Memory as Exemplar --; Chapter Three Analogical Memory --; Chapter Four Collective Memory in an Age of Digital Transformations – A Different Kind of Currency? --; Chapter Five De-commemoration Practices --; Chapter Six Concluding Remarks – Towards the fourth wave of Memory Studies? --; References --; Index
• Format: Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.
• ISBN: 9783111211763
• ISSN: 2747-5689
• DOI: 10.1515/9783111211763
• Access: restricted access
• Hierarchical level: Monograph
• Statement of Responsibility: Tracy Adams.

Why is the past so dominant in the present? This book conceptualizes collective memory as currency, a medium of exchange, a system in common use, and one that is traded between and within nations. Bringing together contemporary case studies and multidisciplinary scholarship, this volume shows how past events are used and perceived as a commodity and a substantially fungible marketable item produced to satisfy wants or needs, their supply or demand being a part of one universal market. This book provides readers with a broader understanding of the power of the past in the present. Specific past events are incarnated into collective memories that can transform into iconic, almost mythical stories that can be employed to help make sense of the present. Through evoking, constructing and reconstructing, selectively highlighting certain aspects or perspectives of prominent past events, these collective memories become a significant resource that actors and publics turn to in times of need. As currency, these memories provide a service. As currency, they can also relatively easily travel between collectives, since it is commonly understood that the past has value in the present, and that this value is similarly utilized in various countries around the world.