Memory and Nation Building

Memory and Nation Building: From Ancient Times to the Islamic State (Rowman & Littlefield, 2018) addresses the complex topic of collective memory, first described by sociologist Maurice Halbwachs in the first half of the 20th century. Author Michael Galaty ’91 argues that the first states appropriated traditional collective memory systems in order to form. With this in mind, he compares three Mediterranean societies — Egypt, Greece, and Albania, each of which experienced very different trajectories of state formation. Galaty is professor of anthropology at the University of Michigan and directs its Museum of Anthropological Archaeology.