Collective memory and social media

Abstract

This review examines how the field of digital memory studies analyzes social media's transformation of collective memory. We trace theoretical reconceptualizations of collective memory to concepts like connective memory and memory of the multitude, showing how platformization reshapes remembering and forgetting through algorithmic curation. The review identities new mnemonic practices enabled by social media – hashtag commemoration, memetic memory, and digital memory activism – which demonstrates how platform features both democratize and manipulate historical narratives. We identify key challenges: methodological and data access limitations, Western-centric bias, and artificial intelligence as emerging memory agents. As social media platforms continuously evolve as primary sites for memory construction, digital memory studies must constantly adapt its approaches to understand how societies remember in changing networked environments.