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The Social Life of Memory

Violence, Trauma, and Testimony in Lebanon and Morocco

Palgrave Macmillan
  • Stakes a critical claim for attending to the tension between the lieu and milieu of memory, a tension implicating site-specific social practices
  • Brings together research from scholars across the humanities and social sciences within a cohesive framework
  • Addresses themes of violence, trauma, and testimony to illustrate how they accrue conceptual relevance, and consequently a careful consideration of how concepts and theories "travel" and come to be exposed in different contexts and subsequently modified

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Cultural Heritage and Conflict (PSCHC)

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About this book

This edited volume addresses memory practices among youth, families, cultural workers, activists, and engaged citizens in Lebanon and Morocco. In making a claim for ‘the social life of memory,’ the introduction discusses a particular research field of memory studies, elaborating an approach to memory in terms of social production and engagement. The Arab Spring is evoked to draw attention to new rifts within and between history and remembrance in the regions of North Africa and the Middle East. As authoritarian forms of governance are challenged, official panoramic narratives are confronted with a multiplicity of memories of violent pasts. The eight chapters trace personal and public inventories of violence, trauma, and testimony, addressing memory in cinema, in newspapers and periodicals, as an experience of public environments, through transnational and diasporic mediums, and amongst younger generations.


Editors and Affiliations

  • Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient, Berlin, Germany

    Norman Saadi Nikro, Sonja Hegasy

About the editors

Norman Saadi Nikro has an Australian-Lebanese background, and holds a PhD (1998) from the University of New South Wales, Australia, and a Habilitation degree (2013) from the University of Potsdam, Germany. His book The Fragmenting Force of Memory: Self, Literary Style, and Civil War in Lebanon came out in 2012.

Sonja Hegasy is the Vice Director of the Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient (ZMO) in Berlin. She studied Arabic and Islamic studies at the American University in Cairo, Egypt, and at Columbia University in New York, USA. In 1996 she received her PhD from the Free University of Berlin, Germany with a thesis on State and Civil Society in Morocco (in German).

Bibliographic Information

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 79.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book USD 99.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book USD 139.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access