Giorgia Proietti (Trento), Memory and space

Despite the connection between memory and space has always been intrinsic to any attempt to understand and conceptualize the functioning mechanisms of memory (just think of the pre-modern theories of loci memoriae), it was only starting from the ‘40s of the past century that the nexus between memory and space has been valued in the field of historical and sociological research. Starting from the seminal work by Maurice Halbwachs on the legendary topography of the Holy Land (1941), several studies have explored issues of memory and space combined in their attempt to analyse how groups and societies makes sense of their present and past and narrate stories about that. This seminar will illustrate the main theories and concepts developed in the historical and sociological field which highlight the interdependence between the formation of memories and spatialization, from Halbwachs himself to Assmann, from Lefebvre to Zerubavel.

Giorgia Proietti is a Tenure-Track Assistant Professor in Greek History at the Department of Humanities of the University of Trento, and Coordinator of the Interdepartmental Lab Memory and Society at the same University. She has recently been Principal Investigator of the National Project ‘Memory and Space in ancient Athens. Topography, Memory and Mindscapes’, funded by the Italian Ministry of University and Research (2023-2025). Her research interests mainly focus on the history, topography, monumental and epigraphic landscape of Classical Athens, with special regard to war and war related phenomena, and their different means of representation and memorialization. She has recently co-edited the volume ‘Memory, Space and Mindscapes in Ancient Greece’, with J. McInerney (Mnemosyne Supplement Series 500, Brill/De Gruyter), and she is currently co-editing (with S.K. Kingsley) the ‘Oxford Classical Guide to Herodotus’ (Oxford University Press). Her first monograph ‘Prima di Erodoto. Aspetti della memoria delle Guerre Persiane’ was published in 2021 as a Hermes Einzelschrift for Steiner Verlag.