Presented by the Department of Spanish and Portuguese Literatures and Cultures Colloquium and the Camoes Fund
With Elsa Peralta, CEC-University of Lisbon and Brown University
In line with Michael Rothberg's concept of 'multidirectional memory' (2009) this paper addresses the new constellations of remembrance that are produced through uneven memories of the Portuguese colonial empire in postcolonial Portugal. Calling for a closer encounter between Memory Studies and Postcolonial Studies, this paper proposes a research agenda that locates disparate and sometimes antagonistic communities and their memories within the same analytical frame. Departing from a principle of 'differentiated similitude,' my purpose is to engage in a dialogical mode of memory analysis that cuts across lines of color, status and class (Du Bois 1952) to head towards an ethics of remembrance of the history of the Portuguese colonial empire.
Elsa Peralta, PhD in Anthropology (University of Lisbon, 2006), is a research fellow at the Center for Comparative Studies (CEC) of the Faculty of Arts & Humanities, University of Lisbon, Portugal. During the Spring Semester of 2019 she is the FLAD/Michael Teague Visiting Professor in the Department of Portuguese and Brazilian Studies, Brown University. Her work draws on perspectives from anthropology, memory studies and postcolonial studies, and focuses on the intersection between private and public modes of recall of past events, in particular of the colonial past. At the present she coordinates the Research Line "Legacies of Empire and Colonialism in Comparative Perspective" and is currently working on the research project "Narratives of Loss, War and Trauma: Portuguese Cultural Memory and the End of Empire." Her work includes several articles and chapters, as well as the edited volumes Heritage and Identity: Engagement and Demission in Contemporary Society (2009), Cidade e Imperio: Dinamicas Coloniais e Reconfiguracoes Pos-Coloniais (2013), Retornar: Tracos de Memoria do Fim do Imperio (2017). She is also the author of Lisboa e o Fim do Imperio (2017). She was the curator and scientific coordinator of the exhibition "Return - Traces of Memory" produced by the City of Lisbon in 2015.
