Peripheral Memories

After a period of intense work on national memory cultures, we are observing a growing interest in memory both as a social and an individual practice. Memory studies tend to focus on a particular field of memory processes, namely those connected with war, persecution and expulsion. In this sense, the memory - or rather the trauma - of the Holocaust is paradigmatic for the entire research field. The Holocaust is furthermore increasingly understood as constitutive of a global memory community which transcends national memories and mediates universal values. The present volume diverges from this perspective by dealing also with everyday subjects of memory. This allows for a more complete view of the interdependencies between public and private memory and, more specifically, public and family memory.

Elisabeth Boesen (Dr.) is a cultural anthropologist working at the University of Luxembourg. Her research interests include rural spaces and social-cultural change, family memory, migration/spatial mobility (Europe and West Africa). Fabienne Lentz is a historian who is doing her PhD thesis on migration memory in Italian immigrant families in Luxembourg. Michel Margue (Prof. Dr.) teaches history at the University of Luxembourg. He is a specialist in medieval history and his research interests include national memory and processes of identity formation. Denis Scuto (Dr.) teaches history at the University of Luxembourg. His research interests include working class history and migration history. Renée Wagener is a social scientist at the University of Luxembourg, a consultant and a journalist. She is presently concluding her doctoral thesis on the Jewish community in Luxembourg.