Rejecting, re-shaping, rearranging: Ways of negotiating the past in family narratives

Abstract

Constructing a shared past is one of the ways to integrate young people into their communities. In a multicultural post-socialist society like Estonia, different narratives sometimes complement, but often compete with each other. Thus, the conflicting stories need to be negotiated to create a usable past. Based on 14 interviews within 5 families, the article explores the issues of negotiating memory in family contexts. It will be argued that in certain cases the tales of kin need to be re-shaped, rearranged or reasoned in order to relate to grand national narratives. When family stories would not allow to identify positively with patterns of institutionalized memory, the national discourse is either rejected, ignored, or relativized to reconcile the versions. The article calls for looking into the mechanisms of these reconciliations on the individual level to find ways of shaping the collective narratives for a more cohesive mnemonic culture.