Vernacular de-commemoration: How collectives reckon with the past in the present

Abstract

This research develops a new framework through which to understand vernacular de-commemoration, as one aspect of bottom-up reckoning with the past through material commemoration. The productivity of breaking with the past distances us away from monumentality and toward action. Vernacular de-commemoration is part of a broad bottom-up process that goes beyond the mere withdrawal of uncomfortable reminders of the past from the public space, or even the recontextualization of public markers. Analyzing and comparing two case studies in the United States, and the United Kingdom, this research examines how vernacular de-commemoration is performed. In some instances, following the destruction of the now-contested memory site, new and alternative sites are installed (i.e. “re-memorialization”); other times, there may be a considerable delay, and sometimes nothing new is installed. Seen in this way, re-memorialization is always preceded by de-commemoration, and, in turn, de-commemoration is not always the final word in the constant negotiation about the meaning of the past in the present.