Abstract
Beginning with Maurice Halbwachs's theory of collective memory and the great body of sociological, historical, and political-science literature on war and aggression that postdates Halbwachs, the author attempts to identify the elements of aggressor-victim memory through a detailed analysis of the 1994 Rwandan genocide. In participant and third-party narratives of the genocide, it is possible to observe a commemorative quality in the campaign of mass murder. The author suggests that the persistence of post-traumatic culture and the failure of dialogue can lead people to kill in remembrance of earlier aggression: in such cases, "acting out" substitutes for "working through," with horrifying consequences.
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