Resumen de Past imperfect

Henry L. Roediger, James V. Wertsch

• Roediger and Wertsch opine that collective memory refers to the way in which groups of people remember the past. Such memories can form far a family, a business, a city, or even for a nation. Of course, individuals hold the memories, but studies show that personal memories can converge as individuals discuss events or across generations as events are recounted. The empirical study of collective memory is a fairly recent endeavor, and researchers turn to many sources--newspaper accounts, interviews and by examining how frequently certain words or phrases occur in large volumes often. Recently, social scientists have begun to survey large groups of people about their recollections of events, to assess memories more directly. This kind of quantitative research examines recollections of many people, and so provides a more consensual view of collective memory.