Places of Public Memory: The Rhetoric of Museums and Memorials

by Greg Dickinson (Editor), Carole Blair (Editor), Brian L. Ott (Editor)

A sustained and rigorous consideration of the intersections of memory, place, and rhetoric
 
Though we live in a time when memory seems to be losing its hold on communities, memory remains central to personal, communal, and national identities. And although popular and public discourses from speeches to films invite a shared sense of the past, official sites of memory such as memorials, museums, and battlefields embody unique rhetorical principles.
 
Places of Public Memory: The Rhetoric of Museums and Memorials is a sustained and rigorous consideration of the intersections of memory, place, and rhetoric. From the mnemonic systems inscribed upon ancient architecture to the roadside accident memorials that line America’s highways, memory and place have always been deeply interconnected. This book investigates the intersections of memory and place through nine original essays written by leading memory studies scholars from the fields of rhetoric, media studies, organizational communication, history, performance studies, and English. The essays address, among other subjects, the rhetorical strategies of those vying for competing visions of a 9/11 memorial at New York City’s Ground Zero; rhetorics of resistance embedded in the plans for an expansion of the National Civil Rights Museum; representations of nuclear energy—both as power source and weapon—in Cold War and post–Cold War museums; and tours and tourism as acts of performance.
 
By focusing on “official” places of memory, the collection causes readers to reflect on how nations and local communities remember history and on how some voices and views are legitimated and others are minimized or erased.
 

296 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2010

Reviews

[Bill DeGenaro · Rating 3 out of 5]

Useful set of essays on how cultures form collective identity by remembering and memorializing the past. Good bits on Detroit's Joe Louis fist and Harlem's jazz museum. I'd have been interested in even more international sites.

[Rokia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recommend this to anyone who enjoys exploring historical documentation and archives. Some good essays.

[Zachary · Rating 5 out of 5]

One review of this book noted how it tends to ignore actual publics who inhabit places of public memory in favor of theorizing about how public memory and place rhetorically fit in together. While I agree with this critique, I also think that the content in the essays is phenomenal enough on its own that it establishes a lot of ground that can then be improved upon by others, which work can include the consideration of publics and visitors that the reviewer saw as lacking in these studies. Overall the book is just incredibly useful to anyone interested in public memory or even phenomenology of place. Highlights include the essay on Alcatraz and the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, which provide some really cool historical background and illuminate some narratives attached to these spaces that just don't get talked about very often--which is kind of their point. Highly recommended to pretty much anyone interested in what places say and mean to people, not just students or scholars of rhetoric, memory, or place.