Connective Arts of Postmemory

Abstract

Can we remember other people’s memories? I believe that we can and that we do. Descendants of individuals and communities that have survived powerful collective experiences –catastrophes such as war, genocide and extreme violence, but also transformative political movements such as coups, revolutions and uprisings– often feel as though they were shaped by events that preceded their birth. They experience these events not as memories, but as postmemories; they are belated, temporally and qualitatively removed.