| The Uses of Memory |
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The newish Annenberg Project video series, Art Through Time: A Global View, features a good introduction to the relationship between History and Memory. Another Annenberg program, Bridging World History includes a similarly titled piece from a different perspective: History and Memory. Both programs include supplementary materials that are accessible to all. Nobel Laureate Daniel
Kahneman (Economics) talks about the "remembering self" in his
TED lecture on The
Riddle of Experience vs. Memory. The Memory Exhibit at the Exploratorium in San Francisco is an archive of a mult-disciplinary museum exhibit from a few years ago. A long, and somewhat rambling, but rather interestng lecture by Lewis Hyde, Remembering and Forgetting, can be heard via RealAudio player; I cribbed some of the subject matter we talked about in class from this presentation. The Interdisciplinary Study of Memory from the 2003-2005 project at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia: "Interdisciplinarity in the Study of Memory: cognition, culture, and complexity." The page includes several links to potentially useful sites. Memory Palace The name for this website comes from the ancient rhetorical practice of placing the "objects" of a speech in an imaginary room (a "memory palace") and going "through" the room to remember the particulars of the speech. The site itself is interesting, and refers to itself as "an audio-visual documentary web site committed to questioning conventional assumptions about art and culture." You also need RealAudio for this one, but it does have links to a text version. Mappa Mundi's Memory Palace page contains some history and a bibliography. The technique of using spaces to help one recall events and/or objects stems from the story told here, and from Cicero's book on public speaking, De Oratore. Recently, journalist Joshua Foer used the memory palace concept to become a champion rememberer (I think I made that word up). His book, Moonwalking With Einstein recalls his experiences in memory contests, and includes techniques one can use to help develop the capacity to remember information for whatever reason. Iraq's Memory Foundation "With the fall of Saddam Hussein, a group of Iraqi-born activists have created the Iraq Memory Foundation to help Iraqis come to terms with their past." This is a story presented by Renée Montagne of National Public Radio. Wikipedia's article on "Memory" provides a clear overview of its many aspects. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy also contains a comprehensive article. Artistotle's "On Memory and Remeniscence" translated by J. I. Beare, from the Internet Classics Archive. Memory has long been a focus of philosophical inquiry, and Aristotle's essay covers many of the problems that continue to fascinate modern thinkers. Mining The Past To Construct The Future: Memory and belief as forms of knowledge is an essay by Chris Westbury and Daniel C. Dennett, at the Center For Cognitive Studies, Tufts University. The paper is pretty technical, but offers some interesting insights concerning the relationship between history and memory. A site recommended by the Chronicle of Higher Education for having about 1000 links: Best of History Web Sites. If the topic of memory is at all interesting to you, consider moving over to my museum links, Wunderkammern. resources
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