(Web)sites of memory and the rise of moral mnemonic agents

Abstract

This article underscores the ethical dimension of collective memory and examines how the advent of digital networked technologies challenges the mechanisms society employs to deny memories of immoral acts. The study will be grounded on an analysis of two organizations’ websites. The first was designed by members of Machsom Watch – an all-female organization whose members monitor the human rights of Palestinians at checkpoints set up by the Israeli Army. The second website was established by Shovrim Shtika – an all-male organization of veteran Israeli soldiers who collect testimonies of their comrades-in-arms who served in the Occupied Territories. The study shows that by producing (web)sites of memory in which members of the organizations store, and by which they disseminate personal memories, they establish a new archival formation that feeds into social practice. The on-line archives they create become an eminently social practice, a space of living memory and a sphere of moral engagement.