"Remembering the War, Forgetting the Terror: Appeals to Family Memory in Putin's Russia."

My project examines the resurgence of the cult of the Great Patriotic War in the 2000s after its decline in the late 1980s and 1990s and the simultaneous marginalization of memories related to Stalin’s repressions.  I investigate why certain constructions of collective memory stick, or have widespread internally persuasive resonance, and others seem to fade. In particular, I analyze how appeals to family memory of the war era in a variety of commemorative contexts construct an obligation to remember the past.  I explore various rhetorical means of shaping public remembrance of WWII and Stalin’s repressions, including both state-sponsored “memory industry” projects and grassroots initiatives that foreground the act of memory as an obligation to one’s family.