Memory in the shadow of a family history of resistance: A case study of the significance of collective memories for intergenerational memory in Austrian families

Abstract

Collective references are of crucial significance for the individual memory. This article discusses the formation and transformation of intergenerational memory in situations where a hegemonic national memory discourse provides the only available reference point. On the basis of a biographical and multigenerational single case study of one family, the article traces the constitution of an intergenerational memory which is marked by the fact that, in their remembering, the family members’ only reference point is an Austrian national memory that disowns resistance to Nazism and downplays the role of Austrians in Nazi crimes. The fact that family members have no access to an alternative collective memory that acknowledges the resistance has a crucial influence on the intergenerational memory: the role of resistance in the family history is depoliticized and dehistoricized, and the Nazis are relieved of responsibility for their actions. Along this empirical finding, the article discusses the significance of the entanglement and figuration of collective reference, individual memory and intergenerational memory.