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Morpheus - Revista Eletrônica em Ciências Humanas - Ano 09, número 14, 2012
ISSN 1676-2924
MEMORY, SOCIAL REPRESENTATIONS AND IMMATERIAL CULTURE
Valdir Jose Morigi
UFRGS- Doctorate in Sociology from USP – Prof. PPGCOM 33165432 - [email protected]
Carla Pires Vieira da Rocha
UFRGS- Master’s Degree student at PPGCOM –
33165432 - [email protected]
Simone Semensatto
UFRGS- Master’s Degree student at PPGCOM –
33165432 - [email protected]
ABSTRACT:
This paper reflects on social memory, its articulation with social representations, and its role as
mediator in the construction of meanings derived from manifestations of immaterial culture. It
takes as an example the study of community celebrations, cultural practices which take place in
the municipality of Estrela/RS, to demonstrate how knowledge of tradition and the local cultural
is produced, transmitted and used, involving different social agents and the network of
sociability responsible for the construction of an information network and the sharing of
meanings that permeate the space of the celebration. In this process, social representations
exercise the mediation produced in the sharing of meanings, as constitutive raw materials of
immaterial culture and of the intangibility of social memory.
KEYWORDS: Social Representations; Immaterial Culture; Social Memory
1 INTRODUCTION
Some issues currently permeate the debates on immaterial culture and social memory. The
multiple forms of production and circulation of cultural manifestations – religiosity, arts,
narratives, discourses, and literature – have assumed new meanings and forms through the
interfaces between the cultural industry and the tradition of local cultures. In this sense, we can
review some questions: What is the meaning of memory of local and regional cultural traditions,
represented by immaterial culture? What is the meaning of rediscovering the past or
reencountering the past in the present?
The transmission of tradition, anchored in the memories and past learning processes within
individual or collective memories through socially shared experience, emphasizes the
importance of celebrations as practices for the continuity of the local culture. The transmission
of tradition via memory enables the production of shared meanings, as an active and dynamic
process and the fruit of previously instituted power relationships, which construct what we
recognize as part of human culture.
The rural community celebrations of the municipality of Estrela/RS, as cultural practices that
communicate collective learning processes and knowledge, are used as an example for
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understanding how part of the local cultural tradition depends on the transmission of the group’s
values and exchanges of knowledge between the protagonists of the celebrations. In this
process, social representations exercise the symbolic mediation produced in the sharing of
meanings, as the constitutive raw material of immaterial culture and intangibility of social
memory.
2 MEMORY AND SOCIAL REPRESENTATIONS: ARTICULATION, MEDIATION AND
IMMATERIAL CULTURE
Memory can be understood from several scientific perspectives. In the fields of sociology and
social psychology, memory can be conceived through its socio-cultural character, which is the
perspective adopted in this study. In this context, remembrance and memorization are seen as
culturally constructed processes that are part of the dynamics of the social life.
According to Braga (2000), human memory is conceived as a process elaborated in the
collective movement emerging from interactions, and is constituted in culture. Both symbolic
signs (oral and written words) and iconic signs (drawn or sculpted images) can serve as a
support for the construction of memory. Thus, it can be anchored in several supports: text, oral
communication, sounds, images, etc. (GONDAR, 2005).
According to Pollak (1992), social memory is a collective and social phenomenon, collectively
constructed and submitted to constant transformations. It transmits inherited local culture and is
constituted by socially experienced events. From this point of view, there are three elements
that serve to support memory: experienced events, people, and places. These elements are
responsible for establishing emotional ties between people. According to the author, memory is
selective, since not all facts are registered, and individuals only have memories of the moments
to they attach importance and which, for some reason, are subjectively distinguished. In
addition, part of the memories can be inherited from events related to their ancestors.
According to Braga (2000), remembrance is affected by unconscious transformations, because
of individual or collective interests and feelings; however, “[...] this movement is only possible if
the people were a part or are still a part of the same social group,” (2000, p.51). From this
perspective, collective memory is only effective in as far as the feelings, thoughts and actions of
each individual are expressed in social means and circumstances, where they share a bond,
coexistence and knowledge.
For Halbwachs (1990), individual memory is not entirely closed. It is limited in time and space.
Collective memory also suffers the same limits. Historical events are auxiliary in our memory;
they do not play any other role, except for dividing time as shown on a clock or determined by a
calendar.
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For an individual to remember his past he has to recall the memories of others. These are
points of reference that are fixed by society. Consequently, collective memory involves feelings
of belonging and identity, since memory is always dependent on interactions and social groups.
Collective memory is characterized by an intense emotional component that emerges from the
interaction and experiences between members of the community. Thus, it is important to
maintain the integrity and survival of the group in time. The group makes the time of the
collective memory. For Halbwachs (1990), the construction of permanent social ties, maintained
with relative strength among individuals, is directly linked to the cohesion guaranteed by social
situations of memory. Such situations are understood as a system of values that unify
determined groups: family and friends, religion, class, etc.
Memory is a social construction, produced by men out of their relationships, values and lived
experiences. It is transformed with the passage of time, and the history of individuals takes new
routes. Thus, it can be said that memory is not only a historical register of facts, but a
combination of past social constructions, with significant factors of the present social life, in a
process of continual reconstruction.
Representation originates in a subject (individual or collective) immersed in specific conditions
of his space and time, and is referred to an object (JODELET, 2002). The author proposes three
factors to be taken into account in the production of representations: culture, communication,
and the insertion of socio-economic, institutional, educational and ideological levels. According
to Jodelet (2002, p. 22), social representations act as “[...] a form of socially elaborated and
shared knowledge, with a practical objective, which contributes to the construction of a common
reality for a social group.” In other words, they follow the needs, interests and desires of the
group. Daily symbolic representations express and articulate different forms of knowledge,
which help in the construction of identities, cultural practices and traditions, which in turn form
lifestyles.
In Moscovici’s conception (2003, p.37), our mind is not exempt from social conditioning imposed
by its representations. Language and culture structure and organize our thoughts, since:
All systems of classification, all images and all descriptions that circulate
within a society, even as scientific descriptions, implicate a bond of
previous systems and images, a stratification of collective memory and a
reproduction in language that invariably reflects earlier knowledge and
breaks the ties of the present information.
Thus, the force of a representation is not due to its social origin, but to possibility of it being
shared by all and strengthened by tradition. Likewise, “to categorize someone or something
means to choose one of the paradigms stored in our memory, and establish a positive or
negative relationship to it.” Anchoring and objectifying are two ways of dealing with memory.
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The first is responsible for the movement of memory, “[...] it is always placing and removing
objects, people, and events, which it classifies according to the type and labels them with a
name.” The second is directed “[...] outside (the others), taking from there concepts and images
to join them and reproduce them in the exterior world, to make things known from what is
already known,” (MOSCOVICI, 2003, p.63-78).
Jovchelovitch (2000) demonstrates how social representations are constituted in forms of
symbolic mediation ingrained in the public sphere, affirming that “The potential space, that of
symbols, both connects and separates the subject from the object-world. So it is of the essence
of the potential space to recognize a shared reality – a reality of the Other,” (p.178).
Consequently, it is the mediation space “[...] between social subject and alterity, in the struggle
to give meaning to and understand the world, that the works of social representation are found,”
(p.178). Social representations are born and circulate in spaces of “relative intersubjectivity.”
According to Moscovici (2003, p. 99), “[...] representations substitute the flow of information that
comes to us through the external world: representations are mediating bonds between the real
cause (stimulus) and the concrete effect (response). Thus, the bonds are mediators or random
causes.”
According to Lefebvre’s theory (1983), it is through social representations that symbolic
relationships are manifest; the societal forms, hierarchies, social positions and feeling of the
group identity are strengthened. Representations circulate around institutions, symbols and
archetypes, intervening in experience and practice, forming part of them, but without dominating
them.
Meanwhile, still in keeping with Lefebvre (1983), memory cannot be confused with
representation, and its distinction resides in actual experience, "While there is presence, the
past is intertwined with the present and conserves the changing vivacity of the present, which
does not mean presence, but an absence in the presence. While it is represented, the past is
fixed and dies both in history and in subjective memory.” The author continues with his
argument observing that it is frequent that the present (‘the now’) is represented through the
past by a memory, "When the past, still alive, dies in representation, it substitutes memory,” (p.
63, free translation). From his viewpoint, this means that the representation is situated between
the experienced and the conceived, acting as a mediator, on an individual level, of the
subjective conscience.
This similarity can be seen in thought and action, in the common sense of a determined group
or society. According to Arruda (2002), the theory of social representation does not separate the
subject from his context, nor from the subjectivity of the construction of his knowledge.
For Gondar (2005, p. 24) “[...] representations are only a part: that which is crystallized and was
legitimized in a collectivity.” The author adds that memory as a process, “[...] is much more than
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a group of representations; it is also exercised in a non-representational sphere: ways of
feeling, ways of wanting, small gestures, practices of the self, and innovative political actions.”
Memory cannot be reduced to representation. “We can articulate emotion and representation in
the production of memory as integral parts of the same process,” (p.25). From this perspective,
a social representation “[...] is something more than a generic and instituted idea that is
imposed on us: all representations are invented and we invent them, making use of a novelty
that affects us and our wager on possible paths.” The author concludes that, “This invention is
propagated, repeated and transformed into a habit. It is from these habits that men become
similar [...],” (GONDAR, 2005, p.25).
A great deal of the knowledge of popular culture is transmitted orally, without any written
records. This process occurs from one person to another, passed on from father to son, from
one group to another, and from one generation to the next. In this form of communication, social
memory plays a fundamental role, since the preservation and continuity of group traditions
depend on the memories of its members. The transmission of cultural values and tradition
occurs through the social memory of the groups that share the same time and geographical
space.
To contemplate the role of social memory in the construction of meanings in immaterial culture,
we need to consider that “memory demands a reflection on involved social processes,
announced or experimented in the manifestation, persistence, and transformations of social
practice and the cultural contents expressed by social segments in a situation," (MORAES,
2000, p.99). Similarly, as Jean Davallon observes, it is not enough to remember an event or
knowledge for this social memory to be mobilized, “The remembered event needs to
reencounter its vivacity; and above all, it needs to be reconstructed from the data and common
notions of the different members of the social community," (2007, p.25).
Investigating the articulation between memory and social representations is useful for
understanding the construction of the meanings of manifestations of immaterial culture.
Focusing on these community celebrations in the interior of Estrela/RS enables us to
understand this articulation and mediation. Community celebrations, by reestablishing the
emotional bond of the participants with the community and its past, based on a common
experience around immaterial culture, enable the construction of social memory.
3 COMMUNITY CELEBRATIONS, TRANSMISSION OF KNOWLEDGE, TRADITION, AND
MANIFESTATIONS OF IMMATERIAL CULTURE
The community celebrations are characterized by cultural practices by which the traditional
knowledge and local culture are produced, transmitted, and used. In this context, the
maintenance of social memory is associated with immaterial culture. Similarly, the practices that
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permeate the celebrations involve the construction of social representations; a process of
internalization of roles is seen in its protagonists, situating them in both the daily places they
occupy and in the space of the celebration, influencing the processes of their identity
constructions and their notions of belonging.
In the dynamic of the celebration, cultural tradition possesses centrality; it is exalted from the
conception of the event and is perpetuated in the naturalization of the cultural practices, in the
reproduction of the differences of behavior, in the forms of conceiving the world, in the
relationships of power between males and females and their spaces, being manifest even in
their beliefs, their way of life, the collective memory and the social history of the group.
Considering that traditions can be reinvented and redefined over time, one can observe that
"[...] tradition is not only what remains, but rather a dynamic history that seeks to find spaces,
visibility and importance, because of the conditions and social rhythms of the contradictions that
modernity itself, by being dynamic, versatile and mutable, produces," (TEDESCO; ROSSETO,
2007, p. 15).
Memory emerges in the groups and their rituals. Consequently, the celebrations are occasions
in which, in conjunction with the affirmation of traditions, the routine of the past seeks to
maintain and renew its meanings, through the construction of common, individual, collective and
historical memories. According to Moraes (2000, p.95), "memories actually coexist in our culture
[...] juxtaposing, integrating or struggling, in a conceptual ‘mosaic network,’ aspects of distinct
and contradictory expressions, in the practice and representations of the individuals and
groups."
In the transmission of tradition, from generation to generation, the construction that the present
makes of the past becomes important, insofar as “memory, considered in a plural sense, is an
expression of a feeling, and a way of understanding and relating to the world," (MORAES, 2000,
p.95). Fragments of memory emerge from the act of narrating, and, in its representations, the
collaborators reconstruct the memory of previous times, confronting the past in the present. This
is where its denomination of history from the present time is derived.
The question of the transmission of culture is related to the survival of social coexistence.
Similarly, an individual taking part in the cultural processes means the possibility of taking part
in the society of one’s time. A culture is richer the more the common knowledge enables it to
integrate, and for this to occur, recognition of the most differing forms and expressions of culture
becomes necessary. Within the innumerable definitions of culture, we can return to the early
anthropological meaning by Tylor, "[...] the complex that includes knowledge, beliefs, arts,
morals, laws, customs, and other aptitudes and habits acquired by men as members of society,"
(TYLOR apud LARAIA, 1986, p.25). It is worth noting that the term immaterial culture, though it
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supposes a contraposition to material culture, is an artifice that we use in order to better
understand its articulation with the immateriality of social memory.
By resuming our reflection on community celebrations, we can explore the cultural dimension of
the practices developed there, observing one of the important issues to be contemplated in our
time, which is the relationship between local cultures and the impact produced by urban
technical progress. This focal point makes it necessary for us to understand, above all, the
processes of affirmation of identities and construction of memories linked to immaterial culture,
from the perspective of the transformations that we have been experiencing on a global level
and that have repercussions in the most distinct spheres.
Community celebrations are the festivals held in commemoration of the patron saints of the
local communities, mother’s clubs, youth groups and choral leagues. The concern of their
protagonists is based on the continuity of this tradition, which is justified by the exodus of the
children of small communities towards the cities of the region, in search of work in shoe
factories and other industries. Small-scale family production is no longer able to absorb the
labor and maintain their children for the harvest work, resulting in their displacement to the
urban centers.
In view of this situation, the values imposed by the model of consumer society begin to hold
precedence. These values involve changes in behavior and in the ways of relating. Therefore,
the festivals, as spaces of sociability, anchored in familiar, emotional relationships of
companionship and solidity, which are characterized by interpersonal recognition and selfrecognition, give way to individualized sociability, the cold, ephemeral and distant relationships
of contemporary society. The concept of Bauman (2007) can be evoked, when he explores new
social bonds in our “liquid-modern” society.” The metaphor of liquidity is used by the author to
explore all the dimensions of experience, where the dynamic of consumerism rules. From this
perspective, the “liquid life” is characterized, among other aspects, by “loose bonds and
revocable commitments,” (2007, p.15-16).
By resuming the focus on local culture, the forms of urban entertainment are imposed as
symbols of these changes in the forms of sociability, consisting in that which is considered
“modern” and “developed,” in contraposition to values and standards of regional culture seen as
“traditional” and “conservative.” In this context, the standards and values of urban culture
become more attractive to the eyes of the younger generations: the dynamic of consumer
society treats culture, its expressions and regions and local manifestations as though they were
disposable objects and things. In this way, cultural events and happenings are configured as
entertainment governed by the logic and the vicissitudes of the market. This dynamic includes
an intensified influence of media on culture, where the ephemeral and the saturation of
information determine a movement distancing from memory towards forgetfulness.
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It is important to highlight the significance of memories in the process of individual and social
identity. The meaning of identity consists of arrangements and rearrangements of vestiges,
fragments and events of the past. Memory is, by nature, fragmented. The recreation of an
internal world is important for strengthening social relationships, in order to constitute a sense of
“us”; a common feeling of belonging, in which the past should be seen as something finished,
but as a possible time of having new meaning, from the present towards the future. As
Silverstone highlights (2005, p.234): "[...] memory is what we have in the private and public
arena to locate ourselves in space and especially in time."
Memories of people – neighbors, parents, grandparents – are the foundation of the festivals.
These remembrances of the local communities initially recall the notion of individual memory;
“[...] it is that which is guarded by an individual and relates to their personal experiences, but
that also contains aspects of the social group memory where he grew up, or rather, where he
was socialized,” (VON SIMSON, 2001, p.63).
In the view of Ribeiro, "[...] memory of the celebration is an essential data in the fixation of
knowledge that is learned, experienced and enjoyed there. It is what, in a certain way, assures
its repetition; it is remembered in the memory and anticipated in the imagination," (2002, p. 41).
Celebrations are a part of the cultural history of humanity. Though its dimensions change over
time, its strength persists in the sense of maintaining the identity bonds among the participants
and their communities of origin.
History and ancestors are attributed, when reconstructing a distant past. As Tedesco and
Rosset (2007, p. 22) observe: “Celebrations need to be symbolized, and consequently, need to
be given meaning by traditions and constant translations in harmony with the past and
symbology of ethnic ancestry.” In this sense, the celebration possesses symbols of
communication, expression and human experiences; cultures that need to be preserved and
reconstructed, since the representations are mediating bonds of the community’s cultural
memory, established by the different ways of retelling the past: stories of life, groups,
communities, etc.
Social representations act as forms of symbolic mediation rooted in the public sphere, where
daily symbolic productions express and articulate different forms of knowledge. These support
the construction of identities, cultural practices and traditions, conforming to different ways of
life. Consequently, as spaces of intersubjective reality, we can consider these community
celebrations as spaces of celebration of memory that are auxiliary in the education of an
individual identity and a collective feeling of belonging. From this we can contemplate the
intangibility of social memory and its articulation with a construction of meaning and immaterial
culture.
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4 FINAL CONSIDERATIONS
Collective memory is an important element for maintaining the integrity and survival of a group
in time. Thus, it can be characterized as an intense emotional component that emerges from the
interactions and sharing of experience between members of the community. Celebrations, as
social spaces, strengthen the bonds of sociability and offer the exchange of knowledge, valuing
the practices of local culture.
Memory plays a fundamental role in the construction of community history, since it is linked to
the ways of life that act as guides, giving generational models of behavior over the years. To
think of memory as a reconstruction of the past, based on well-defined and delineated social
situations, according to Halbwachs, leads us to affirm that it is woven by our emotions and our
future expectations, conceiving it as a focal point of resistance at the heart of the relationships
of power, and serving to maintain the values of a social group.
The memory of the subjects of the celebration is permeated by tensions derived from the
articulations between emotions and representations, expressed through the communication of
instituted and shared knowledge (as a way of cultivating the cultural roots of tradition). However,
we cannot forget the non-representational dimension of the memories that cross the space of
the celebrations through unique gestures, sensibility, practices of the self, inventions, and
unique creations that are also integral and constructive to the subjectivity of the subjects of the
celebrations. This dimension can become the refuge of the “residual” elements of the emotional
exchanges, with the potential to transform and innovate ways of living and being in the world,
creating new formats of social life.
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