Narrating Historical Injustice

Political Responsibility and the Politics of Memory

Datos Bibliográficos

ID7439009
AutoresDavid Myer Temin (0000-0002-1449-7324, University of Michigan, autor de correspondencia), Adam Dahl (0000-0001-8815-9689, University of Massachusetts Amherst)
Año2017
Volumen70
Número4
Páginas905-917
Fecha de publicación2017-07-05
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaPolitical Research Quarterly (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1065-9129 • E-ISSN: 1938-274X
EditorialSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/1065912917718636
OpenAlexW2734537266
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas14
Referencias citadas35

Memory and justice are intricately linked. To adequately address historical wrongs, liberal democracies must engage the past. Historical memory provides a connective tissue between past wrongs and present injustices. Yet the question that arises with the politics of memory and its usefulness for addressing historical injustice resides precisely in the process by which we create historical memory. More than just an acknowledgment of past events, collective memory is constructed through narrative and memorial practices that impart meaning to past events. This paper amends the politics of memory by attending to the complex relationship between the narrative figuration of historical wrongs and present attributions of collective responsibility. By viewing memory of historical wrongs as narrative constructions of the past, we argue that the narrative form of historical injustice shapes contemporary notions of political responsibility. In elaborating this claim, we examine how different narrative representations of historical injustice engender different understandings of collective responsibility. Through a reading of the Native American political theorist Vine Deloria Jr.’s famous work, Custer Died for Your Sins, we then explore how irony and satire help expose the limitations of tragic, romantic, and comedic narratives in conceptualizing political responsibility for historical injustice

Collective memory · Collective responsibility · Injustice · Politics of memory · Critical Race Theory in Education · Race, History, and American Society · Rhetoric and Communication Studies