Memorials, social representations and collective memory of political repression in Russia

2021 ◽  
pp. 127-140
Author(s):  
Inna BOVINA ◽  
Pascal MOLINER
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Social Representations ◽  
Political Repression

scholarly journals To Remember or to Forget: Political Repression in the Collective Memory of Descendants

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 825-848
Author(s):  
Inna B. Bovina ◽  
Tatiana V. Ryabova ◽  
Vladislav Y. Konkin
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Traumatic Event ◽  
Social Representations ◽  
Emotional Reactions ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Proximal Development ◽  
Political Repression ◽  
Psychological Knowledge ◽  
New Variables

The question of political repression divides society and polarizes public discourse. Understanding political repression through the prism of socio-psychological knowledge is a zone of proximal development for researchers, because the suicidal nature of repression, which A.M. Etkind points out, makes it difficult to understand terror, hinders the work of mechanisms that operate in a society that has come into contact with a catastrophe of such magnitude and duration. The study is devoted to the study of social ideas about repression, as well as emotional reactions towards repression and the repressed among the descendants of the repressed, i.e., their children and grandchildren. A total of 110 people (61.82% - females) aged 44 to 78 years, 93.63% with higher education, participated in the study. The sample included three groups: the generation of children (21 people, M = 59.52 years; SD = 9.04); the generation of grandchildren (63 people, M = 54.71 years; SD = 7.66); and the control group (26 people, M = 53.65 years; SD = 7.72). A survey in the form of a questionnaire was used, followed by a prototypical analysis of associations, which made it possible to identify the structure of ideas about repression in the three groups. To analyze emotional reactions, a factor analysis of scores on 38 scales was carried out, followed by an analysis on the new variables. The characteristics of the structure of social representations (the core and periphery zones) are consistent with the initial hypothesis that the supposedly traumatic event of repression is perceived as a personal one by the descendants but as a social one by the respondents of the control group. There were no differences in the severity of emotional reactions in relation to the category of repressions and repressed between the generations. The combined group of descendants significantly differs from the control group in the greater severity of indicators when assessing the category of repression by the factors of Anxiety, Depression and Grief, and when assessing the category of repressed by the factor of Grief. The results of the study of social ideas about the past allow us to talk about the collective memory of repression in two generations of the descendants of the repressed: in the structure of the inner world of generations of descendants, repression is a personal event of family history, colored by sorrowful feelings of varying degrees of intensity and depth.

scholarly journals The useful past in negotiation: Adolescents' use of history in negotiation of inter-group conflict

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tsafrir Goldberg
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Social Representations ◽  
Historical Documents ◽  
Formal Schooling ◽  
Historical Knowledge ◽  
Collective Memories ◽  
Group Relations ◽  
The Past ◽  
Collective Narratives ◽  
The Impact

Much of the concern with young people's historical knowledge centres on factual attainment or disciplinary skills. However, relatively little attention is paid to the relevance that young people attribute to history and how they use the past, and various social representations of history, to relate to the present. Research in this realm tends to emphasize the impact of collective memory narratives on individuals, rather than individuals' agency in using them. In this article, I will examine the ways 155 Jewish and Arab Israeli adolescents related the past to the present as they discussed the Jewish–Arab conflict and its resolution. Discussants made diverse references to the past: from family history, via biblical allusions and collective memories, to formal, schooling-based historical documents. Individuals used these references to the past to negotiate the present and future of inter-group relations. Furthermore, they made strategic use of references to others' narratives. Thus historical knowledge and collective narratives, which are usually perceived as constraining and structuring learners' perceptions, can be seen as repositories of resources and affordances.

scholarly journals The naturalized nation: Anchoring, objectification and naturalized social representations of history

2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 646-669 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eemeli Hakoköngäs ◽  
Inari Sakki
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Social Representations ◽  
Visual Images ◽  
Semiotic Analysis ◽  
Collective Memories ◽  
Conceptual Clarity ◽  
Social Representations Theory ◽  
Visual Element ◽  
Meaning System ◽  
History Books

This study focuses on the connection between social representations of history and collective memory from the perspective of elementary concepts of social representations theory: anchoring, objectification and naturalization. The aims of the study are to arrive at a conceptual clarity of this connection and demonstrate how to apply basic concepts of social representations theory to the study of collective memory. The study also focuses on the naturalized characteristics of Finnish history. The data consist of the covers of twenty Finnish history books between the years 1965 and 2014. All the covers are embellished with typography or visual images. The covers were analysed using a semiotic approach in which the interest is in the description (denotation), the associations (connotation) and the meaning system these construe (myth). The analysis shows how national history is concretized with visual images (objectification), how the meaning of representation is conveyed (anchoring) and how collective memory is maintained (naturalization), transmitted and shaped during the years. The results show how the stable collective memories and changing social representations of history are interacting. The most frequently used visual element was the colour blue, which alludes to the Finnish flag, a symbol of the nation that represents the core of Finnish history. The study suggests that it is possible to conceptualize collective memories as naturalized social representations of history. It shows how processes of anchoring and objectification serve as tools of collective memory and how the naturalized conceptions are subtly changed. In addition, the study develops the use of visual semiotic analysis in social representations research.

Commitment to pro- versus counter-attitudinal behavior and the dynamics of social representations

2002 ◽  
Vol 61 (1) ◽  
pp. 34-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Tafani ◽  
Lionel Souchet
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Social Representations ◽  
Cognitive Restructuring ◽  
Social Representation ◽  
Two Dimensional ◽  
Dimensional Model ◽  
Social Actions ◽  
The Social ◽  
Two Dimensional Model ◽  
Students Attitudes

This research uses the counter-attitudinal essay paradigm ( Janis & King, 1954 ) to test the effects of social actions on social representations. Thus, students wrote either a pro- or a counter-attitudinal essay on Higher Education. Three forms of counter-attitudinal essays were manipulated countering respectively a) students’ attitudes towards higher education; b) peripheral beliefs or c) central beliefs associated with this representation object. After writing the essay, students expressed their attitudes towards higher education and evaluated different beliefs associated with it. The structural status of these beliefs was also assessed by a “calling into question” test ( Flament, 1994a ). Results show that behavior challenging either an attitude or peripheral beliefs induces a rationalization process, giving rise to minor modifications of the representational field. These modifications are only on the social evaluative dimension of the social representation. On the other hand, when the behavior challenges central beliefs, the same rationalization process induces a cognitive restructuring of the representational field, i.e., a structural change in the representation. These results and their implications for the experimental study of representational dynamics are discussed with regard to the two-dimensional model of social representations ( Moliner, 1994 ) and rationalization theory ( Beauvois & Joule, 1996 ).

Social representations of human rights violations: Further evidence

2001 ◽  
Vol 60 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alain Clémence ◽  
Thierry Devos ◽  
Willem Doise
Keyword(s):  
Cluster Analysis ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Costa Rica ◽  
Young People ◽  
Social Representations ◽  
Social Reality ◽  
Questionnaire Study ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
High Tolerance ◽  
Individual Actions

Social representations of human rights violations were investigated in a questionnaire study conducted in five countries (Costa Rica, France, Italy, Romania, and Switzerland) (N = 1239 young people). We were able to show that respondents organize their understanding of human rights violations in similar ways across nations. At the same time, systematic variations characterized opinions about human rights violations, and the structure of these variations was similar across national contexts. Differences in definitions of human rights violations were identified by a cluster analysis. A broader definition was related to critical attitudes toward governmental and institutional abuses of power, whereas a more restricted definition was rooted in a fatalistic conception of social reality, approval of social regulations, and greater tolerance for institutional infringements of privacy. An atypical definition was anchored either in a strong rejection of social regulations or in a strong condemnation of immoral individual actions linked with a high tolerance for governmental interference. These findings support the idea that contrasting definitions of human rights coexist and that these definitions are underpinned by a set of beliefs regarding the relationships between individuals and institutions.

Liberté d'opinion et limite normative dans une représentation sociale: le développement de l'intelligence 1Ce texte reprend l'essentiel d'un exposé présenté en juin 1998 à la Faculté de Psychologie et des Sciences de l'Education de Genève, à l'occasion de la collation du Doctorat Honoris Causa de l'Université de Genève à l'auteur.

1999 ◽  
Vol 58 (3) ◽  
pp. 201-206 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claude Flament
Keyword(s):  
Social Representations ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Individual

This paper is concerned by a possible articulation between the diversity of individual opinions and the existence of consensus in social representations. It postulates the existence of consensual normative boundaries framing the individual opinions. A study by questionnaire about the social representations of the development of intelligence gives support to this notion.

Appropriation des Savoirs et Mémoire Collective

2013 ◽  
Vol 72 (2) ◽  
pp. 71-78
Author(s):  
Sophie Richardot
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Factorial Analysis ◽  
Experimental Results ◽  
Ancient History ◽  
Historical Events ◽  
Memoire Collective ◽  
Obedience To Authority

The aim of this study is to understand to what extent soliciting collective memory facilitates the appropriation of knowledge. After being informed about Milgram’s experiment on obedience to authority, students were asked to mention historical or contemporary events that came to mind while thinking about submission to authority. Main results of the factorial analysis show that the students who do not believe in the reproducibility of the experimental results oppose dramatic past events to a peaceful present, whereas those who do believe in the reproducibility of the results also mention dramatic contemporary events, thus linking past and present. Moreover, the students who do not accept the results for today personify historical events, whereas those who fully accept them generalize their impact. Therefore, according to their attitude toward this objet of knowledge, the students refer to two kinds of memory: a “closed memory,” which tends to relegate Milgram’s results to ancient history; and an “open memory,” which, on the contrary, transforms past events into a concept that helps them understand the present. Soliciting collective memory may contribute to the appropriation of knowledge provided the memory activated is an “open” one, linking past to present and going beyond the singularity of the event.

Social Representations and Commitment

2018 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 233-249 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Bonetto ◽  
Fabien Girandola ◽  
Grégory Lo Monaco
Keyword(s):  
Social Representations ◽  
Social Representation ◽  
Second Line ◽  
Review Of The Literature ◽  
First Line ◽  
Research Perspectives ◽  
The Social ◽  
Bibliographic Search ◽  
English Articles

Abstract. This contribution consists of a critical review of the literature about the articulation of two traditionally separated theoretical fields: social representations and commitment. Besides consulting various works and communications, a bibliographic search was carried out (between February and December, 2016) on various databases using the keywords “commitment” and “social representation,” in the singular and in the plural, in French and in English. Articles published in English or in French, that explicitly made reference to both terms, were included. The relations between commitment and social representations are approached according to two approaches or complementary lines. The first line follows the role of commitment in the representational dynamics: how can commitment transform the representations? This articulation gathers most of the work on the topic. The second line envisages the social representations as determinants of commitment procedures: how can these representations influence the effects of commitment procedures? This literature review will identify unexploited tracks, as well as research perspectives for both areas of research.

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