Landscape and memory

Connections between landscape and memory are well documented (Schama 1995; Lowenthal, 995; Atkinson and Cosgrove, 1998); and have been the subject of sustained enquiry in the humanities and social sciences. In pondering then, our contribution on landscape and memory, we employ a spatial focus and examine the role of place in understandings of memory and landscape. The chapter is structured around what we consider three primary modes of thinking about and reading memory and landscape: representational approaches to memory, or modes of reading memory landscapes; the politics of memory representations and landscape choice; and non-representational frames for thinking through non-material memory traces. While a considerable portion of recent memory research has operationalised the latter mode of thinking (ours included, see for example Drozdzewski et al, 2016), and focused on non-representation, affect and encounter, we have pursued a more inclusive approach to highlight multiple ways of understanding landscape and memory. In our own research, each 'mode of thinking' has proven useful exploring the intricate and though-provoking relationships between landscape and memory.