Maurice Halbwachs | |
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| Born | (1877-03-11)11 March 1877 Reims, France |
| Died | 16 March 1945(1945-03-16) (aged 68) |
| Relatives | Jeanne Halbwachs (sister) |
| Philosophical work | |
| Main interests | Sociology, philosophy, psychology |
| Notable ideas | Collective memory |
Maurice Halbwachs (French:[mɔʁisalbvaks]; 11 March 1877 – 16 March 1945) was aFrench philosopher andsociologist known for developing the concept ofcollective memory. Halbwachs also contributed to the sociology of knowledge with hisLa Topographie Legendaire des Évangiles en Terre Sainte, a study of the spatial infrastructure of theNew Testament (1951).[1][2]
Born inReims, France, Halbwachs attended theÉcole Normale Supérieure in Paris. There he studied philosophy withHenri Bergson, who had a major influence on his thinking. Halbwachs' early work on memory was in some measure pursued to coincide with Bergson's view on the subject of memory being a particularly personal and subjective experience.[2] Bergson taught Halbwachs for three years.[3] He thenaggregated in Philosophy in 1901. He taught at variouslycées before traveling toGermany in 1904, where he studied at theUniversity of Göttingen and worked on catalogingLeibniz's papers until 1907. He was nominated to co-edit an edition of Leibniz's work which never came to fruition.
He returned to France in 1905 and metÉmile Durkheim, who sparked his interest in sociology. Initially, when meeting Durkheim, Halbwachs was looking for advice on how to move from his previous focus on Philosophy to Sociology. Halbwachs also began to focus on scientific objectivism rather than his Bergsonian Individualism.[1] He soon joined the editorial board ofL'Année Sociologique, where he worked withFrançois Simiand andLévy-Bruhl editing theEconomics andStatistics sections. In 1909 he returned to Germany to studyMarxism and economics inBerlin. Durkheim gave Halbwachs the idea of societal movements and how the environment, people are influenced by Sociological research. This also goes into how different class systems function in broad networks of society.[4]
ThroughoutWorld War I, Halbwachs worked at the War Ministry. Beginning in 1919,[5] shortly after the end of the war, he became professor ofsociology andpedagogy at theUniversity of Strasbourg (1919). He remained in this position for over a decade, taking leave for a year in 1930 as a visiting professor at theUniversity of Chicago, when he was called to theSorbonne in 1935. There he taught sociology and worked closely withMarcel Mauss and served as the editor ofAnnales de Sociologie, the successor journal toL'Année Sociologique. He taught as a professor of sociology in Sorbonne, Paris from 1935 to 1943 and a professor of social psychology at theCollege de France from 1943 until death. From 1935 until his death he also served as the secretary-general ofAnnales de Sociologie. In 1944 he received one of France's highest honors, a chair at theCollège de France inSocial Psychology. During this time, Halbwachs dedicated his time to in-depth research in the field where sociology and psychology overlap to provide a bit of a timeline.[5] Towards the end of his life, Halbwachs was recognized for his contributions to sociology. He was elected into the Conservative Academie des Sciences Morales et Politiques. He was also recognized as the Vice President of the French Psychological Society, while also being called to chair at Sorbonne.[1]
He was married to Yvonne Basch, who introduced Halbwachs to her father, the president of the League for the Defense Human Rights and also influenced him to join the Jewish religion (he was born Catholic).[6] He had a son,Pierre Halbwachs, who influencedDeleuzian theory in the 1940s.
A longtimesocialist, Halbwachs was detained by theGestapo in Paris in July, 1944[5] after protesting the arrest of his Jewish father-in-law.[7] He was deported to the concentration camp,[5]Buchenwald, where he died ofdysentery in February[5] 1945.[8]
In 1940, Halbwachs' brother in-law, Georges Basch committed suicide. His parents in-law Victor and Mme Basch aged 84 years old at the time were murdered by Germans.[5]
Part of his books were offered by his widow to the library of theCentre d'études sociologiques and are now held at theHuman and Social Sciences Library Paris Descartes-CNRS.
In 1950, his work on collective memory was published posthumously by his daughter.[9]
Halbwachs' most important contribution to the field of sociology came in his bookLa Mémoire collective, 1950 ("The Collective Memory"), in which he advanced the thesis that a society can have acollective memory and that this memory is dependent upon the "cadre" or framework within which a group is situated in society. Thus, there is not only an individual memory but also a group memory that exists outside of and lives beyond the individual. An individual's understanding of the past is strongly linked to this group consciousness because every person can contribute a different memory or perspective to the collective group memory. Group memory is also different for every group that experiences a certain event, therefore "every group has its own collective memory and that collective memory differs from the collective memory of other groups.[10] This idea of memory being pursued proves people's expression of commemoration in our culture. Commemoration offers collective memory ties to society and its conceptions where physical monuments and rituals fix and affirm collectivity.[2]
Halbwachs Collective Memory includes two laws governing how this form of memory will evolve: a Law of Fragmentation, and a Law of Concentration.[11]
Halbwachs also wrote an important book on suicide,Les Causes du suicide, 1930 ("The Causes of Suicide"). In this book he followed the footsteps of his mentorÉmile Durkheim (who was also a French Sociologist) expanding and elaborating upon the former's theories on suicide. Specifically, he focused on ideas such as, the ways in which rural and urban styles of life explain variations in suicide rates. Halbwachs also continued to further Durkheim's conceptualization of how specific family styles and religious backgrounds alter rates of suicide.[1]
Halbwachs included in hisLes Cadres Sociaux de la Memoire (1952) the significance of the collective memory operating on the systems of family, religion and social communities.[2]
Halbwachs takes an interesting perspective regarding the relationship between memory and history. He believed that memory and history oppose each other when it comes to reliability. Memory can be transformed based on perspective, which makes it a questionable form of scholarly appreciation for the past. Whereas historians analyze history from a completely unbiased perspective, analyzing it in a critical way from a distance.[2]
Halbwachs contributed to the world of social psychology as well with his thesis onLa Classe ouvrière et les niveaux de vie which translates to, "The Working Class and the Standards of Living".[5] This work allowed Halbwachs to analyze and observe how working-class families managed their budgets. He discovered that families and individuals not only plan out their budget for what they need in the moment but what they also need in the future, which forces them to put into perspective what is necessary in the moment. His research is a modification of Durkheim's theory of collective representation.[5]
Halbwachs showed how memory can not exist without society influencing the mind, embracing how collective consciousness impacts us each and every day. This taught us that social structure shapes the way we think an act on the world. He also establishes the difference between memory which is subjective and history is factual in its background.[12]
Halbwachs was influenced by ideas of Emile Durkheim, such as collective consciousness, with adding more to this term by individual and collective memory.
Halbwachs was also influenced by Henri Bergson's stance on subjectivity, which creates states how this impacts our consciousness and intuition.[13]
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