Unavailable
Unavailable
Unavailable
Ebook322 pages3 hours
Time Maps: Collective Memory and the Social Shape of the Past
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
3.5/5
()
Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this ebook
"Time Maps extends beyond all of the old clichés about linear, circular, and spiral patterns of historical process and provides us with models of the actual legends used to map history. It is a brilliant and elegant exercise in model building that provides new insights into some of the old questions about philosophy of history, historical narrative, and what is called straight history."-Hayden White, University of California, Santa Cruz
Who were the first people to inhabit North America? Does the West Bank belong to the Arabs or the Jews? Why are racists so obsessed with origins? Is a seventh cousin still a cousin? Why do some societies name their children after dead ancestors?
As Eviatar Zerubavel demonstrates in Time Maps, we cannot answer burning questions such as these without a deeper understanding of how we envision the past. In a pioneering attempt to map the structure of our collective memory, Zerubavel considers the cognitive patterns we use to organize the past in our minds and the mental strategies that help us string together unrelated events into coherent and meaningful narratives, as well as the social grammar of battles over conflicting interpretations of history. Drawing on fascinating examples that range from Hiroshima to the Holocaust, from Columbus to Lucy, and from ancient Egypt to the former Yugoslavia, Zerubavel shows how we construct historical origins; how we tie discontinuous events together into stories; how we link families and entire nations through genealogies; and how we separate distinct historical periods from one another through watersheds, such as the invention of fire or the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Most people think the Roman Empire ended in 476, even though it lasted another 977 years in Byzantium. Challenging such conventional wisdom, Time Maps will be must reading for anyone interested in how the history of our world takes shape.
Who were the first people to inhabit North America? Does the West Bank belong to the Arabs or the Jews? Why are racists so obsessed with origins? Is a seventh cousin still a cousin? Why do some societies name their children after dead ancestors?
As Eviatar Zerubavel demonstrates in Time Maps, we cannot answer burning questions such as these without a deeper understanding of how we envision the past. In a pioneering attempt to map the structure of our collective memory, Zerubavel considers the cognitive patterns we use to organize the past in our minds and the mental strategies that help us string together unrelated events into coherent and meaningful narratives, as well as the social grammar of battles over conflicting interpretations of history. Drawing on fascinating examples that range from Hiroshima to the Holocaust, from Columbus to Lucy, and from ancient Egypt to the former Yugoslavia, Zerubavel shows how we construct historical origins; how we tie discontinuous events together into stories; how we link families and entire nations through genealogies; and how we separate distinct historical periods from one another through watersheds, such as the invention of fire or the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Most people think the Roman Empire ended in 476, even though it lasted another 977 years in Byzantium. Challenging such conventional wisdom, Time Maps will be must reading for anyone interested in how the history of our world takes shape.
Unavailable
Read more from Eviatar Zerubavel
Time Maps: Collective Memory and the Social Shape of the Past Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Taken for Granted: The Remarkable Power of the Unremarkable Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Time Maps
Related ebooks
China: An Interpretive History: From the Beginnings to the Fall of Han Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Outline of History: Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Saeculum: Defining Historical Eras in Ancient Roman Thought Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIs Time out of Joint?: On the Rise and Fall of the Modern Time Regime Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsImperial nostalgia: How the British conquered themselves Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Mirror of the Medieval: An Anthropology of the Western Historical Imagination Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsImagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5China on My Mind Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWestern Civilization to 1500 Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Medievalist Comics and the American Century Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBecoming Historians Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Recovering the Piedmont Past: Unexplored Moments in Nineteenth-Century Upcountry South Carolina History Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCulture/Power/History: A Reader in Contemporary Social Theory Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ethics through Literature: Ascetic and Aesthetic Reading in Western Culture Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Ethos of History: Time and Responsibility Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Rosetta Key for History: The Generational Pattern of Time: Rosetta Key, #1 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSearching for the Real Jesus: Jesus, the Dead Sea Scrolls and Other Religious Themes Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Meaning and Representation in History Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLegends and Stories for a Compassionate America Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHuman Rights and the Uses of History Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Essays on the Presidents: Principles and Politics Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Struggle for the Past: How We Construct Social Memories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPolygamy and the Rise and Demise of the Aztec Empire Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Memory: Fragments of a Modern History Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Disintegrating Conscience and the Decline of Modernity Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Cult of the Saints: Its Rise and Function in Latin Christianity, Enlarged Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Global Memoryscapes: Contesting Remembrance in a Transnational Age Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsClio among the Muses: Essays on History and the Humanities Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Struggle to Be Gay—in Mexico, for Example Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRecent Developments in European Thought Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Social Science For You
My Secret Garden: Women's Sexual Fantasies Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Body Is Not an Apology, Second Edition: The Power of Radical Self-Love Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Art of Witty Banter: Be Clever, Quick, & Magnetic Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row (Oprah's Book Club Selection) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5All About Love: New Visions Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Come As You Are: Revised and Updated: The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5King, Warrior, Magician, Lover: Rediscovering the Archetypes of the Mature Masculine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Like Switch: An Ex-FBI Agent's Guide to Influencing, Attracting, and Winning People Over Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5100 Amazing Facts About the Negro with Complete Proof Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A People's History of the United States Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Denial of Death Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fervent: A Woman's Battle Plan to Serious, Specific, and Strategic Prayer Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Great Reset: And the War for the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5You're Not Listening: What You're Missing and Why It Matters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Human Condition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Barracoon: The Story of the Last "Black Cargo" Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Just Mercy: a story of justice and redemption Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I Don't Want to Talk About It: Overcoming the Secret Legacy of Male Depression Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Time Maps
Rating: 3.6428585714285715 out of 5 stars
3.5/5
7 ratings1 review
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Brief, readable book about the ideology of historical narratives and timekeeping systems (i.e., the calendar). I'm no stranger to the ideological dimension of the quotidian, so the revelations on hand here didn't feel especially startling, but having so many examples so accessibly presented kept the book enjoyable.