Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Television, Collective Memory and the Commemoration Cure

  • Chapter
Values and Choices in Television Discourse

  • 260 Accesses

Abstract

This chapter examines commemoration in television factual programming (news and documentaries) with a view to teasing out its discursive realisations and demonstrating through four interrelated case studies the potential cross-cultural valence of such discourse realisations. Commemoration is a widely used term which broadly refers to ‘the practices and artefacts [...] that social groups mobilise to represent the past to them and others’ (Conway 2010: 444). In its social group dimension, commemoration is closely linked to a central notion in the interdisciplinary field of Memory Studies, namely that of collective memory. This term was introduced by the French sociologist Maurice Halbwachs (1925/1992, 1950/1980) in the 1920s.1 For Halbwachs all individual memory is necessarily constructed within social institutions and structures, that is, memory depends upon the ‘cadre’ within which specific social groups are situated.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  • Alexander, J. C. (2004), ‘On the social construction of moral universals: The “Holocaust” from war crime to trauma drama’, in J. C. Alexander, R. Eyerman, B. Giesen, N. Smelser and P. Sztompka (eds.), Cultural Trauma and Collective Identity. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, pp. 1–30.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Bednarek, M. and Caple, H. (2012), ‘ “Valued added”: Language, image and news values’, Discourse, Context and Media, 1(1): 103–113.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Benjamin, A. (ed.) (2011), Successful Remembering and Successful Forgetting: A Festschrift in Honor of Robert A. Bjork. Sussex: Taylor and Francis.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bietti, L. M., Stone, C. B. and Hirst, W. (2014), ‘Contextualizing human memory’, Memory Studies, 7(3): 267–271.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blondheim, M. and Liebes, T. (2002), ‘Live television’s disaster marathon of 11 September and its subversive potential’, Prometheus: Critical Studies in Innovation, 20(3): 271–276.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blum-Kulka, S. (1993), ‘ “You gotta know how to tell a story”: Telling, tales, and tellers in American and Israeli narrative events at dinner’, Language in Society, 22(3): 361–402.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Brown, S., Middleton, D. and Lightfoot, G. (2001), ‘Performing the past in electronic archives: Interdependencies in the discursive and non-discursive organisation of institutional rememberings’, Culture & Psychology, 7(2): 123–144.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Brown, S. and Reavey, P. (2014), ‘Vital memories: Movements in and between affect, ethics and self’, Memory Studies, 7(3): 328–338.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Caldwell, J. T. (1995), Televisuality: Style, Crisis, and Authority in American Television. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cameron, D. (2000), Good to Talk? Living and Working in a Communication Culture. London: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Castelló, E. (2014), ‘Disrupting “Wills to Truth”. How Catalan TV documentary contributed to the democratization of Spanish civil war narratives’, Memory Studies, 7(2): 223–238.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cienki, A., Bietti, L. and Kok, K. (2014), ‘Multimodal alignment during collaborative remembering’, Memory Studies, 7(3): 354–369.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Connerton, P. (2008), ‘Seven Types of Forgetting’, Memory Studies, 1(1): 59–71.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Conway, B. (2010), ‘New directions in the sociology of collective memory and commemoration’, Sociology Compass, 4(7): 442–453.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cotter, C. (2010), News Talk. Investigating the Language of Journalism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Doss, E. (2010), Memorial Mania: Public Feeling in America. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Edy, J. A. (2006), Troubled Pasts: News and the Collective Memory of Social Unrest. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fowler, R. (1981), Literature as Social Discourse: The Practice of Linguistic Criticism. London: Batsford Academic.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gavriely-Nuri, D. (2014), ‘Collective memory as a metaphor: The case of speeches by Israeli prime ministers 2001–2009’, Memory Studies, 7(1): 46–60.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Halbwachs, M. (1925/1992), On Collective Memory. Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Halbwachs, M. (1950/1980), The Collective Memory. New York: Harper Colophon.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hoerl, K. (2009), ‘Commemorating the Kent State tragedy through victims’ trauma in television news coverage’, The Communication Review, 12(2): 107–131.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hoskins, A. (2004), Televising War: From Vietnam to Iraq. London: Continuum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hoskins, A. (2011), ‘From collective memory to memory systems’, Memory Studies, 4(2): 131–133.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hoskins, A. and O’Loughlin, B. (2010), War and Media: The Emergence of Diffuse Wa r . Cambridge: Polity Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hudson, G. and Rowlands, S. (2007), The Broadcast Journalism Handbook. Harlow: Pearson Longman.

    Google Scholar 

  • Huyssen, A. (2000), ‘Present pasts: Media, politics, amnesia’, Public Culture, 12(1): 21–38.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jarvis, L. (2010), ‘Remember, remember, 11 September: Memorializing 9/11 on the internet’, Journal of War and Cultural Studies, 3(1): 69–82.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jelin, E. (2003), State Repression and the Struggles for Memory. London: Latin America Bureau.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kansteiner, W. (2002), ‘Finding meaning in memory: A methodological critique of collective memory studies’, History and Theory, 41(2): 179–197.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kansteiner, W. (2014), ‘Genocide memory, digital cultures, and the anesthetization of violence’, Memory Studies, 7(4): 403–408.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kansteiner, W. and Weilnbock, H. (2010), ‘Against the concept of cultural trauma’, in A. Erll and A. Nünning (eds.), A Companion to Cultural Memory Studies. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter, pp. 229–240.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kantola, A. (2014), ‘The therapeutic imaginary in memory work: Mediating the Finnish Civil War in Tampere’, Memory Studies, 7(1): 92–107.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kitzinger, J. (2000), ‘Media templates: Patterns of association and the (re)construction of meaning over time’, Media, Culture & Society, 22(1): 61–84.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kliger-Vilenchik, N., Tsfati, Y. and Meyers, O. (2014), ‘Setting the collective memory agenda: Examining mainstream media influence on individuals’ perception of the past’, Memory Studies, 7(4): 484–499.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kress, G. (2010), Multimodality: A Social Semiotic Approach to Contemporary Communication. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Linnell, P. (1998), Approaching Dialogue: Talk, Interaction and Contexts in Dialogical Perspectives. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Lorenzo-Dus, N. (2009), Television Discourse: Analysing Language in the Media. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lorenzo-Dus, N. (2016), ‘Small changes in Spanish political broadcasting? Incisive interviewing and the news show Salvados’, in J. Mortesen, N. Coupland and J.Thøgersen (eds.), Style, Identity and Mediation: Sociolinguistic Perspectives on Talking Media. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lorenzo-Dus, N. and Bryan, A. (2011a), ‘Recontextualizing participatory journalists’ mobile media in British television news: A case study of the live coverage and commemorations of the 2005 London bombings’, Discourse and Communication, 5(1): 1–18.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lorenzo-Dus, N. and Bryan, A. (2011b), ‘Dynamics of memory: Commemorating the 2005 London bombings in British television news’, Memory Studies, 4(3): 281–297.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Macdonald, M. (2006), ‘Performing memory on television: Documentary and the 1960s’, Screen, 47(3): 327–345.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Meyers, O., Zandberg, E. and Neiger, M. (2009), ‘Prime time commemoration: An analysis of television broadcasts on Israel’s Memorial Day for the Holocaust and the heroism’, Journal of Communication, 59(3): 456–480.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Middleton, D. and Brown, S. (2005), The Social Psychology of Experience: Studies in Remembering and Forgetting. London: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Middleton, D. and Edwards, D. (eds.) (1990), Collective Remembering. London: Sage.

    Google Scholar 

  • Misztal, B. (2003), Theories of Social Remembering. Maidenhead: Open University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Montgomery, M. (2007), The Discourse of Broadcast News: A Linguistic Approach. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Murakami, K. (2014), ‘Commemoration reconsidered: Second World War veterans’ reunion as pilgrimage’, Memory Studies, 7(3): 339–353.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nichols, B. (2001), Introduction to Documentary, Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • O’Donnell, H. and Castelló, E. (2011), ‘Neighbourhood squabbles or claims or right? Narratives of conflict on Spanish and Catalan television’, Narrative Inquiry, 21(2): 191–212.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pardo, L. and Lorenzo-Dus, N. (2010), ‘The Falklands/Malvinas 25 years on: A comparative analysis of constructions of heroism on Argentinean and British television’, Journal of Multicultural Discourses, 5(3): 241–258.

    Google Scholar 

  • Plantiga, C. R. (1997), Rhetoric and Representation in Non-fiction Film. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rahman, S. A. (2010), ‘The presence of the past: Negotiating the politics of collective memory’, Contemporary Political Theory, 9(1): 59–76.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Reavey, P. and Brown, S. (2006), ‘Transforming agency and action in the past, into the present time: adult memories of child sexual abuse’, Theory & Psychology, 16(2): 179–202.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Scannell, P. (1998), ‘Media-language-world’, in A. Bell and P. Garrett (eds.), Approaches to Media Discourse. Oxford: Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Scannell, P. (2000), ‘For anyone-as-someone structures’, Media, Culture & Society, 22(1): 5–24.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schwartz, B (1982), ‘The social context of commemoration: A study in collective memory’, Social Forces, 61(2): 374–402.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shattuc, J. (1997), The Talking Cure: TV Talk Shows and Women. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sheffi, N. (2004), ‘Between collective memory and manipulation: The Holocaust, Wagner and the Israelis’, Journal of Israeli History, 23(1): 65–77.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sturken, M. (1997), Tangled Memories. California and London: University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sztompka, P. (2000), ‘Cultural trauma: The other face of social change’, European Journal of Social Theory, 4(4): 449–466.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tilega, C. (2008), ‘What is a “Revolution”?: National commemoration, collective memory and managing authenticity in the representation of a political event’, Discourse & Society, 19: 359–382.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wertsch, J. V. (2002), Voices of Collective Remembering. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Winter, J. (2006), Remembering War: The Great War and Historical Memory in the 20th Century. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zandberg, E. (2010), ‘The right to tell the (right) story: Journalism, authority and memory’, Media, Culture & Society, 32(1): 5–24.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Authors
  1. Nuria Lorenzo-Dus
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Sussex, UK

    Roberta Piazza

  2. University of Bologna, Italy

    Louann Haarman

  3. The Content Lab, UK

    Anne Caborn

Copyright information

© 2015 Nuria Lorenzo-Dus

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Lorenzo-Dus, N. (2015). Television, Collective Memory and the Commemoration Cure. In: Piazza, R., Haarman, L., Caborn, A. (eds) Values and Choices in Television Discourse. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137478474_5

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation