Blank Spots in History and Deep Memory

James V. WertschWashington University in St. Louis

jwertsch@wustl.edu

Blank Spots in Soviet History

• Airbrushing historical figures and events out of the picture

• Literal and figurative airbrushing

• “In the Soviet Union nothing is so unpredictable as the past.”

Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of 1939

• Secret protocol

• Biggest blank spot in Baltic countries

• Open secret since 1947

• But not part of official Soviet history until 1989

• Mnemonic standoff between Russia and Estonia (and others)

Estonian Assumption

• Russian acknowledgement => rewriting of Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and larger Soviet-Estonia relationship

• This has not happened.– Interesting as a local case study– Also, a natural laboratory for larger issue of

“deep memory”

Pitfalls of Psychological Explanation

• Need to avoid methodological individualism– Repression– Collective amnesia of Chang– Defensive reaction

• Mind and memory extend beyond the skin (Bruner, Bateson)

“Distributed” Version of Collective Remembering

• Intellectual debt to Vygotsky, Bakhtin, Lotman

• Remembering as distributed process:

– Active-agent-plus-cultural-tool

• Narrative: prime cultural tool in remembering

• Need to examine narrative tools as well as their use

Narrative Tools for Official History

• History textbooks– Other cultural tools exist: popular media,

songs, other textual resources– Provide official, state-sponsored version of

the past– Mixture of history and memory

• “Memory” textbooks?

– Natural laboratory for examining response to blank spots

Collective Memory vs. History

• Identity project (usually a picture of heroism, victimhood, etc.)

• Impatient with ambiguity

• Ignores counterevidence in order to preserve established narrative

• Aspires to arrive at objective truth, regardless of consequences

• Recognizes complexity and ambiguity

• May revise existing narrative in light of new evidence (archives, etc.)

Collective Memory vs. History