Th e notion of memory is directly related to knowledge. However, it is associ-ated with the mediation of memory and the social practices that bring out the memory (oft en called mnemonic practices). Above all, however, the practice of commemorating perpetuates the same memory, as in the case of all social rituals, and that is why it is important to examine how developed the practice of com-memorating in community is. What memory practices are deployed by Wrocław’s population? As data in the table below indicate, in the general population and among the sample of students there are almost no practices of remembrance.
Guided tours with friends, which are the most common form, are the least typ-ical as a practice of commemoration, and function more as social encounters. It is mainly the elite who manifest commemorative behaviour of all kinds more oft en than both the general population and students. Th e elite participate in the exhibitions of the city’s history, read and buy books, take part in lectures and celebrations dedicated to the history of the city. Th e conclusion from these data again confi rms that the collective memory of Wrocław does not manifest itself at the level of social practices (see Table 8).
Table 8. Social practices of remembrance Social practices of remembrance, mean value
(3 = very often, 0 = never) Elite Wrocław population
N = 547 Students N = 288
Exhibition of the history of the city 1.92 0.82 0.94
Celebration of the history of the city 1.73 0.76 0.68
Reading books about the history of Wrocław 2.20 0.98 1.28
Going to lectures on the city history 1.47 0.26 0.74
Buying books about old Wrocław 1.72 0.55 0.59
Guided tours with friends 1.95 1.38 1.80
Other 0.13 2.18
Conclusions
Th e research on the collective memory of the general population shows that memory is a complex form of knowledge. On the one hand, it shows the domin-ant trends that are expressive qualities of collective knowledge. On the other, the variation in the contents of memory manifested collectively shows distinct niches of memory inside the collective. Th e forms of collective memory vary depending on such factors as social position, education and age. One of these niches is cre-ated by the city’s elite. Our data have shown that there is a strong diff erentiation in forms of memory between the elite and the general population. Th e elite attempt to re-create the collective memory of Wrocław but it does not aff ect the collective memory of the general population very much.
If we assume the existence of a collective memory means the existence of a common story about the past of the city, there is no such memory. We can say that Wrocław has no memory, because it has no distinctive and expressive content which would be shared by the majority of the population. Wrocław’s population’s memory is therefore rather empty. Th is condition of memory was shown in Maria Lewicka’s study, and it is confi rmed in our own study based on a representative sample of Wrocław’s population. We are dealing here with a residual form of memory, with poorly developed identifi cation with a place and a lack of a specifi c and unique narrative for Wrocław. Th e memory is full of con-tradictions, myths, fragmentary information and false beliefs. Our studies show that collective city memory is mainly an elite phenomenon. Th e majority of the population in our sample (that is, about 70–80%) have very poor associations with historic landmarks of urban space. Although about one quarter of the general population shows an interest in acquiring historical information, its memorisa-tion is rather ineff ective. On the one hand, we can look for any forms and contents of collective memory, “a weak version of memory”. Such memory is fi lled with the general, intuitive feeling that Wrocław was a German city and still has an atmosphere associated with the German heritage. Th e Polish-German confl ict is present in Polish consciousness and it aff ects the interpretation of place identity.
Th e Polish-German confl ict is the context for interpreting Wrocław’s identity.
Th erefore identity is expressed in terms of the national, not the local. Due to German-Polish tensions in the post-war period there remains little scope to give German Wrocław’s history a more prominent place in city representation and identity. What we observe in the case of an uprooted community can also be seen as a manifestation of the general process of dehistoricization of private life due to the disappearance of historical roots, personal and family narratives.
Th e dominant form of collective memory is the memory of the recent, post-war period but it is not the characteristic, local memory of Wrocław. Th ere are no social threshold events which would create strong local identity; instead, the multicultural image is proposed. Since it is the invented history, and the image
conjured by marketing, it is doubtful whether multiculturality will survive as a form of local identity.
Finally, I would like to present some questions and doubts that relate to the presented data and analysis. Although it is a tempting opportunity to present a clear thesis on the impact of the social situation on collective memory forma-tion, some doubts must be raised here. It is diffi cult to conclude with certainty that the collective memory of an uprooted community is diff erent than the collective memory of a rooted community. One reason is that formation of memory is a long process and it is not known precisely which factors and how create memory. What we can capture and examine is the state of memory at a particular time. Second, the particular state of memory is a result of many factors, and uprooting is not necessarily the most infl uential element. Th ird, uprooting is itself a complex state.
Fourth, the structure of population is constantly changing (the population of a city is mobile even in cases of rooted communities of e.g. Warsaw and Cracow), so a certain part of the population is constantly uprooted. Fift h, there is also the continuous transformation of oral memory into collective, popular memory and the simultaneous presence of diff erent generational memories — which makes it complicated to answer the question what is that present state of collective mem-ory and how it was formed. Despite the diffi culties, further systematic empirical studies should shed more light on the process of collective memory formation.
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