[The Programme 13-Novembre between individual memory and collective memory].

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to present the evolution of scientific work on human memory from the end of the 19th century. The work of experimental psychology and neuropsychology first dominated the scientific scene. Research in the humanities and social sciences was established in the interwar period, but without any real interaction with psychology and neurosciences. We recall the most emblematic historical works of two distinct visions of memory: those of the experimental psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus who measured memory, on himself, from lists of meaningless syllables, and those of the sociologist Maurice Halbwachs for whom any act of memory is a social act. This disciplinary closure persisted until the end of the 20th century. A real social shift has taken place since the 2000s, with a desire to studying and understanding the interactions between individual and collective memories. In this article, the authors argue for the emergence of "sciences of memory" based on dialectic and transdisciplinarity. They draw on the Programme 13-Novembre that is emblematic of this evolution. The Programme 13-Novembre has seized upon a diversity of research tools on memory by applying them to a traumatic event in French society: the attacks of 13 November 2015 in Paris and its immediate suburbs. Its genesis, its overall architecture and several of its components are presented here, as well as a few results already published. In addition to its theoretical scope, this work has many possible applications, particularly in the understanding and management of various pathologies, post-traumatic stress disorder being the most demonstrative in this respect.