Memory and Material Culture: An Enactive and Ecological Proposal for Memory and Remembering

In collaboration with the Aegean Archaeology Group

Since Aristotle, philosophers, psychologists, anthropologists, and archaeologists have proposed and debated novel ways of considering the relationship between material culture and memory. Some focus on memory as an intercranial, brain-bound phenomenon for which the material world is only the background on which remembering unfolds. Others have attempted to study it from a collective perspective that encompasses both the social and material worlds. 

With its interest in studying the remains of past humans’ actions, archaeology has always had a close connection with material culture and memory. It is undeniable that memory and material culture are the bread and butter of every archaeological endeavour. However, most studies in archaeology and beyond have taken this assumption for granted or produced explanations based on already-existing frameworks in psychology.

In this talk, I sketch a different picture of the relationship between material culture and memory from the vantage point of Material Engagement Theory and Ecological-Enactive cognition. Specifically, I will present my enactive, ecological, extended, and distributed proposal for memory, remembering, and the role that material culture plays using selected examples from some of the case studies I encountered during my doctorate. Ultimately, this talk will be a defence for an integrated, multi-disciplinary approach to the joint study of brains, bodies, and material culture; one that considers the role that sociomaterial contexts and practices play in constituting memory.