Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis...
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Transcript of Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis...
![Page 1: Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis jwertsch@wustl.edu.](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022082821/5697bfd91a28abf838caf4bb/html5/thumbnails/1.jpg)
Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory
James V. WertschWashington University in St. Louis
![Page 2: Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis jwertsch@wustl.edu.](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022082821/5697bfd91a28abf838caf4bb/html5/thumbnails/2.jpg)
Blank Spots in Soviet History
• Airbrushing historical figures and events out of the picture
• Literal and figurative airbrushing
• “In the Soviet Union nothing is so unpredictable as the past.”
![Page 3: Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis jwertsch@wustl.edu.](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022082821/5697bfd91a28abf838caf4bb/html5/thumbnails/3.jpg)
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of 1939
• Secret protocol
• Biggest blank spot in Baltic countries
• Open secret since 1947
• But not part of official Soviet history until 1989
• Mnemonic standoff between Russia and Estonia (and others)
![Page 4: Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis jwertsch@wustl.edu.](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022082821/5697bfd91a28abf838caf4bb/html5/thumbnails/4.jpg)
Estonian Assumption
• Russian acknowledgement => rewriting of Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and larger Soviet-Estonia relationship
• This has not happened.– Interesting as a local case study– Also, a natural laboratory for larger issue of
“deep memory”
![Page 5: Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis jwertsch@wustl.edu.](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022082821/5697bfd91a28abf838caf4bb/html5/thumbnails/5.jpg)
Pitfalls of Psychological Explanation
• Need to avoid methodological individualism– Repression– Collective amnesia of Chang– Defensive reaction
• Mind and memory extend beyond the skin (Bruner, Bateson)
![Page 6: Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis jwertsch@wustl.edu.](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022082821/5697bfd91a28abf838caf4bb/html5/thumbnails/6.jpg)
“Distributed” Version of Collective Remembering
• Intellectual debt to Vygotsky, Bakhtin, Lotman
• Remembering as distributed process:
– Active-agent-plus-cultural-tool
• Narrative: prime cultural tool in remembering
• Need to examine narrative tools as well as their use
![Page 7: Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis jwertsch@wustl.edu.](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022082821/5697bfd91a28abf838caf4bb/html5/thumbnails/7.jpg)
Narrative Tools for Official History
• History textbooks– Other cultural tools exist: popular media,
songs, other textual resources– Provide official, state-sponsored version of
the past– Mixture of history and memory
• “Memory” textbooks?
– Natural laboratory for examining response to blank spots
![Page 8: Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis jwertsch@wustl.edu.](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022082821/5697bfd91a28abf838caf4bb/html5/thumbnails/8.jpg)
Collective Memory vs. History
• Identity project (usually a picture of heroism, victimhood, etc.)
• Impatient with ambiguity
• Ignores counterevidence in order to preserve established narrative
• Aspires to arrive at objective truth, regardless of consequences
• Recognizes complexity and ambiguity
• May revise existing narrative in light of new evidence (archives, etc.)
![Page 9: Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory James V. Wertsch Washington University in St. Louis jwertsch@wustl.edu.](https://reader036.fdocuments.in/reader036/viewer/2022082821/5697bfd91a28abf838caf4bb/html5/thumbnails/9.jpg)
Collective Memory vs. History