Document Type
Article
Abstract
Sociological studies of collective memory have pointed out that forms, such as commemorative genres or the narrative styles, can influence how societies interpret and remember their pasts. [1] While drawing from these studies and from Hayden White's theory of the narrative tropes this essay compares the mnemonic work of style in two works of art - in Günter Grass' novella Crabwalk and in the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington D.C. Both artifacts share attributes that are sociologically interesting: they are social testimonies about a difficult past, though the difficulties that German and American societies experienced are of different kinds, and they address that past via an ambivalent artistic style. Arguing that styles, whether we study their linguistic or their visual expressions, have significant effects on the social construction of memory this essay will ask whether and how can the ambivalence of a narrative trope or a commemorative genre facilitate the articulation of the conflicting memories that different communities circulate about their common past. While leaning on Hayden White's thesis about the prefiguring capacity of the narrative tropes, this essay will examine the novella Crabwalk as a text that anticipates future developments in the German leftist memory about the World War II.
Repository Citation
Gajdosova, Jaroslava. "Social Mnemonics of Style: A Comparative Study of Günter Grass’ novella Crabwalk and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial." Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture vol. 7, no. 4, 2007, pp. 1–18. https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/reconstruction/vol7/iss4/5