Political violence, fear and threat at memory places

Abstract

In this article I will analyze the memories about the recent Chilean past constructed in the context of an investigation that invites people from different generations to visit memory places and to think collectively about the experience of the visit. I will argue that in the construction of these memories political violence, threat and fear operate as referents. While memory operates as an articulating process between past-present-future, what constitute that connection is the political state violence, the threat that this constitutes for those who carry out political actions that question or challenge the social order and the fear it produces. These referents are used to understand the present and to define generational individuals. I will show how three generational positions defined by their relationship to fear are built: the traumatized generation, the generation that inherited the fear and the generation without fear.