The Second Annual Conference of the NSSR Interdisciplinary Memory Group
New Wolff Conference Room (906/913)
6 East 16th Street, 9th Floor, New School for Social Research

For those who study memory, there is a nagging concern that memory studies is inherently backward-looking, and that memory itself—and the ways in which it is deployed, invoked, and utilized—can potentially hinder efforts to move forward. However, there are many memory scholars and practitioners who firmly believe that the study of memory is ultimately about and for the present and future. This Janus-faced view of memory as looking to the past as a way to shape the present and future is the basis for the increasingly relevant and pressing concerns about the relationship of memory to democratic politics: human rights and transitional justice, revenge, imposture and forgery, social movements and utopian moments, and historical facts and scientific technologies.

This conference brings together an interdisciplinary group of prominent scholars and practitioners of memory to examine the relationship between past and present—and especially past and future.

Some of the issues that the conference will address include:

• The internationalization of memory: How are models and meanings transported around the world
• Denial, imposture and historical events—Can a scientific method limit dubious mobilization of memory
• Memory and revenge
• Narrative and visual memory: What do they want memory “to do for them” (Eyal, 2004) or how the form serves the aim
• Memory (Studies) and the Future

Dates: Thursday, February 26 – Friday, February 27, 2009
Location: New Wolff Conference Room (906/913)
6 East 16th Street, 9th Floor
The New School for Social Research

For more information or to join our mailing list, email:
NSSRMemoryConference@gmail.com

New School for Social Research Interdisciplinary Memory Group 2009 Conference Organizing Committee:
Adam D. Brown
Functional Neuroimaging Laboratory, Weill Medical College of Cornell University
Alin Coman
Department of Psychology, New School for Social Research
Lindsey Freeman
Department of Sociology, New School for Social Research
Yifat Gutman
Department of Sociology, New School for Social Research
Ben Nienass
Department of Political Science, New School for Social Research
Amy Sodaro
Department of Sociology, New School for Social Research
Kimberly Spring
Department of Sociology, New School for Social Research

Faculty Advisors:
William Hirst
Department of Psychology, New School for Social Research
Vera Zolberg
Department of Sociology, New School for Social Research