Negotiating cultural identity through the arts: Fitting in, third space and cultural memory

The article examines ways in which arts-based educational approaches were applied to a group of African descendant youth in Western Australia, as a way of understanding challenges to their bicultural socialization and means to developing their bicultural competence. Drawing on African cultural memory as a cultural resource enabled participants to discover the relevance of African cultural memory and embodied knowledge to their bicultural socialization and bicultural competence. The article challenges the argument that successful integration into dominant culture is only possible when migrants remain focused on acquisition of dominant cultural values – ‘Fitting in’. The African Cultural Memory Youth Arts Festival (ACMYAF) offered an alternative conception of successive integration as a process inclusive of creative appropriation and revaluation of ancestral culture through cultural memory. The festival became a third space through which the participants explored embodied knowledge and African cultural memory towards a positive self-concept and bicultural competence

Literary translation and cultural memory

This article intends to investigate the relationship between literary translation and cultural memory, using a twentieth century film version of one of Shakespeare’s plays as a case study in inter-semiotic translation. The common perception of translation is often confined to its use as a language learning tool or as a means of information transfer between languages. The wider academic concept embraces not only inter-lingual translation, but both intra-lingual activity or rewording in the same language and inter-semiotic translation defined by Roman Jacobson as “the interpretation of verbal signs by means of signs of nonverbal sign systems” (Jakobson, 1959: 114)

These are the echoes: Sound Proof 2008-2012

Article in peer-reviewed journal Culture/Kultura for their thematic issue, Art Media and Cultural Memory. Based on the conference talk given at CCCS Annual Conference on Cultural Memory 4-7 September 2013

How to constitute an archive of oral memory and identity within the framework of a.P.T.O.: a few methodological proposals

In this paper I will focus on a few problems relating to the cataloguing of anthropological materials concerning the specificity of demo-ethnological and anthropological disciplines like context, confidentiality, the role of the ethnographer and the integrity of the field-work. In order to do this I will discuss the concepts of material and immaterial goods (TUCCI 1999) of objectivity and subjectivity in relation to memory and identity and verify whether the notion of cultural goods are appliable to memory and identity documentative materials (narratives etc.). Other questions I will try to face are: Whether we can consider memory and identity as objects of cultural property; The limits of this perspective; Other problems in documenting and archiving oral culture materials in relation to the identity and memory of the people

Culture modulates implicit ownership-induced self-bias in memory

The relation of incoming stimuli to the self implicitly determines the allocation of cognitive resources. Cultural variations in the self-concept shape cognition, but the extent is unclear because the majority of studies sample only Western participants. We report cultural differences (Asian versus Western) in ownership-induced self-bias in recognition memory for objects. In two experiments, participants allocated a series of images depicting household objects to self-owned or other-owned virtual baskets based on colour cues before completing a surprise recognition memory test for the objects. The ‘other’ was either a stranger or a close other. In both experiments, Western participants showed greater recognition memory accuracy for self-owned compared with other-owned objects, consistent with an independent self-construal. In Experiment 1, which required minimal attention to the owned objects, Asian participants showed no such ownership-related bias in recognition accuracy. In Experiment 2, which required attention to owned objects to move them along the screen, Asian participants again showed no overall memory advantage for self-owned items and actually exhibited higher recognition accuracy for mother-owned than self-owned objects, reversing the pattern observed for Westerners. This is consistent with an interdependent self-construal which is sensitive to the particular relationship between the self and other. Overall, our results suggest that the self acts as an organising principle for allocating cognitive resources, but that the way it is constructed depends upon cultural experience. Additionally, the manifestation of these cultural differences in self-representation depends on the allocation of attentional resources to self- and other-associated stimuli

Traumatic pasts, literary afterlives, and transcultural memory : new directions of literary and media memory studies

This article presents new directions of literary and media memory studies. It distinguishes between (1) the study of "traumatic pasts", i.e. representations of war and violence in literature and other media, (2) diachronic and intermedial approaches to "literary afterlives" and (3) recent insights into the inherent transculturality of memory and their consequences for literary and media studies. Keywords: cultural memory studies, literature and memory, media and memory, transcultural memor

"New Songs of the Battlefield": Songs and Memories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

This dissertation focuses on a five-volume anthology of songs published from 1972 to 1976 known as "Zhandi Xinge," literally "New Songs of the Battlefield." The songs represent a significant portion of the limited musical expression during a period in China known as the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). Published and approved by the Chinese Communist Party, the anthology appeared at a time when artistic and musical activities were extremely restricted. The government utilized this particular musical form for multiple goals, including the propagation of political ideologies, stimulation of party support, and education of the masses. Based upon original research and personal interviews, the dissertation provides the first documentation and analysis of the anthology in any language. Analysis focuses on the official ideology as situated in its socio-historical context, and an examination of individual reception and memory. The study begins with an introduction to the Cultural Revolution period, followed by an investigation of the composition, editing, compilation, themes, texts, and musical characteristics of the anthology. The dissertation concludes with an analysis of the contemporary memory of Cultural Revolution songs while considering concepts of music, memory, and nostalgia. The analysis reveals that the major factors influencing how the music is remembered and who remembers it, is dependent upon a combination of features including music and memory, generational imprinting and changes in contemporary Chinese society

Locating Memory: Introduction

An introduction to the Locating Memory section of Cultural Studies Review 20.

Cultural Memory Archetypes

Actuality of the theme is determined by the interest to the phenomenon of archetype and its ability to translate the content of cultural memory. The definition of “memory” contest is expanded and the history of the phenomenon's study is examined in the article. The determinations of memory types as “historical memory”, “social memory”, “cultural memory” are given on the basis of the studied sources. The phenomenon of archetype, history of its study and basic types of human psyche's archetypes on the basis of Carl Jung's works are investigated. The concept of a cultural archetype, which is used to translate cultural experience of society, is identified in the work.Актуальность темы обусловлена интересом к изучению феномена архетипа и его способностью трансляции содержания культурной памяти. В статье раскрыто содержание понятия «память», отслежена история изучения феномена. На основе изученных источников приведены определения таких видов памяти, как историческая память, социальная память, культурная память. Исследовано понятие феномена архетипа, история изучения понятия, а также приведены основные типы архетипов человеческой психики на основе работ К. Юнга. Рассмотрено понятие культурного архетипа, служащий для передачи культурного опыта общества