The Memory Project

What is a memory?  How are memories made?  How are memories lost?  Erased?  How does a group—a society—remember, then memorialize, an event?

The story of American history involves countless memorializations of the great and hard events in American history—from the Revolutionary War to the Civil War the attacks of September 11.  Our social memory works its way out in our museums; monuments; national, regional, state, and local historical societies; archives; holidays (including Memorial Day, has its own a complicated history); libraries; street names; films and media; reenactments; and the names we put on buildings. 

“The Memory Project” brings a team of talented filmmakers to unfurl stories about the American way of remembering.  They work closely with the project’s distinguished editorial advisory board of historians, psychologists, anthropologists, librarians, and archivists—experts on the way individuals, societies, and countries remember and forget their own history.  The project is sponsoring the widespread collection of American memories and includes documentaries of compelling case studies; digital media published for education on the university level; a digital repository of scientific data and personal stories from the broader community; and a new, immersive installation at science museums that partially simulates the experience of losing one’s memory;

The Memory Project is co-produced with Big Year Productions, Alexandria Productions, the Library of Congress, and the University of Southern California.