Before I Forget: From Personal Memory to Family History

This article presents findings from a field study of 8 persons older than 50 who were undertaking a range of activities with the intention of “recording their memories for posterity.” We describe practices associated with dealing with inherited family archives; the creation of new artifacts (such as scrapbooks and collections of letters) out of repurposed archived materials; and the recording of one's memoirs. Our analysis leads us to emphasise a distinction between “personal” memory and memory “for family,” noting that although memory is used in the construction of a sense of one's own history, and in enabling personal reflection on the past, the work that is bound up with processing archives and producing new artifacts is heavily influenced by a desire to make them accessible and relevant to children and grandchildren, both now and in the future. The tending to, and crafting of, these materials can be understood as a means of creating a “joint” past and reinforcing a wider family narrative. We conclude ...