Abstract

ARONSSON, Peter. Shaping lives: negotiating and narrating memories. Etnográfica [online]. 2015, vol.19, n.3, pp.577-591. ISSN 0873-6561.

Life stories and experiences are shaped within a broad range of uses of heavily institutionalized identity politics, mediated narratives and situational bodily experiences. Acting upon individual desires is a necessity for formation of collective identities and identification, communicatively constructing society. Examples from a variety of contexts will be used to argue that meaning is created through exchange between spheres of different logics: existential, political, market and institutional logics might openly oppose and contradict each other and crave for autonomy. When successful in establishing a powerful historical culture they do nevertheless more often reinforce each other when life experiences and new utopias are being shaped through narrating and negotiating memories to deal with contemporary challenges.

Keywords : uses of the past; historical consciousness; heritage.

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