Digital turn in Memory studies: Forum

Abstract

The scientific forum “Digital Turn in Memory Studies” is dedicated to the newest direction in the study of cultural and collective memory of the past — digital memory. At the end of 2023, the Center for the Study of Cultural Memory and Symbolic Politics of the European University in St. Petersburg organized this discussion, sparking heated debated among Russian historians, archivists, philosophers, cultural scientists, sociologists, anthropologists and media specialists involved in shaping the emerging field of digital memory studies in Russia. The participants discussed the most relevant and underappreciated research problems and approaches related to the study of digital memory. The guests also commented on the theoretical and methodological difficulties in working with various memory intermediaries (social media, video hosting, digital archives, neural networks, video games, Internet memes, etc.) and touched upon the disciplinary differences in the study of digital memory and the possibility of interdisciplinary dialogue. Finally, the authors shared their forecasts on what conditions will affect the future development of DMS in Russia, taking into account, on the one hand, the widespread tightening of Internet policy and corporate interference, and, on the other, the inevitable growth of interest in the digitalization of all aspects of life, including cultural memory and memory policy — in an era when memory studies, quite possibly, will very soon cease to be perceived without the digital prefix.