Making Memory: Bloody Sunday in Northern Ireland

Abstract

This is a study of how collective memory forms out of traumatic experience. It addresses questions about the formation of collective identity out of individual trauma, and, in turn, how individual and collective trauma intertwine. This process of memory formation is illustrated through the example of an incident that took place in Northern Ireland on 30 January 1972, an event that came to be known as Bloody Sunday. A lawyer representing the families of the victims once succinctly described it as a ‘mass murder perpetrated before the world’s media [. . . which] took place over a period of ten to twelve minutes, within a geographical space not much bigger than two football pitches’. To explain how this ‘ten to twelve’ minutes became a powerful symbol of the excesses of state violence and a memory forever linked to Ireland’s history I apply the theory of cultural trauma. Previous research has identified several arenas of memory, ‘social spaces where different narratives of collective memory interact [. . .] distinct discourses that are tied to specific individuals, organizations, and institutions that advocate specific narratives through specific forms of media’. Four areas were identified, the political, the academic, the artistic, and the community. Along with the theory of cultural trauma, I apply that framework in analyzing the memory and memorialization of Bloody Sunday.