Historiography and Collective Memory: a discussion on Yerushalmi’s Zakhor and its  interpretations

Sabrina Costa Braga

doi:10.15848/hh.v16i41.1982

Authors

Sabrina Costa Braga Universidade Federal de Goiás https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9164-7560

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15848/hh.v16i41.1982

Keywords:

Collective memory, Historiography, Judaism

Abstract

Zakhor is the commandment of remembrance often repeated in the Torah. It is also the title of an indispensable book for reflection on Jewish identity in relation to historiography. In this article, I will start with the thesis of the
Jewish historian Yerushalmi to discuss the relationship between memory and historiography in the Jewish context and beyond. Yerushalmi pointed out a distance between collective memory and historiography that is an interesting starting point for reflection on the possibilities of a non-westernized historiography. The text is divided into an introduction, three topics that aim: to present Yerushalmi’s book; to present the main comments to the book; to reflect on the place or non-place of the national element in a Jewish history; and a conclusion. Thus, I will question the tension between memory and history and a possible approximation that goes beyond the modern notion of historiography. Thus, reading Yerushalmi’s thesis as a possibility of rethinking the instruments of historiography.

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Author Biography

Sabrina Costa Braga, Universidade Federal de Goiás

Professora Substituta na Faculdade de História da Universidade Federal de Goiás. Doutora em História pela Universidade Federal de Goiás (UFG) com período sanduíche na Freie Universität Berlin. Defendeu em 2018 a dissertação intitulada "A leitura freudiana de Norbert Elias sobre o nazismo: civilização como produtora de anticivilização", defendeu em 2022 a tese intitulada "O paradigma da Shoah e a historiografia: memória e testemunho sob a ótica do trauma" e atualmente trabalha com temas relacionados à memória, historiografia judaica, literatura de testemunho, relações entre história e psicanálise e história e literatura. Possui experiência na área de História com ênfase em Teoria e Metodologia da História e História Contemporânea. É associada à Sociedade Brasileira de Teoria e História da Historiografia e à International Network for Theory of History (INTH). É editora executiva da Revista de Teoria da História.

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