Micro-memories: Digital modes of communication across three generations

Abstract

This article examines how digital modes of communication serve to facilitate family relations across three generations. Drawing on written interviews with two family chains, three categories of memory co-production are identified: co-construction, sedimentation and recreation. Applying theories of media generations and mediated memory studies, the analysis explores how these memories are shaped and unfolded. The empirical results demonstrate that all family members use digital modes of communication in the constructions of “micro-memories” of family relations, and that the three generations articulate these memories as vernacular archives of their family’s proximate past. The youngest family members represent a “here-and-now” presentism culture, while the middle and eldest family members represent a more classic “what has taken place” culture. In conclusion, it is argued that studies of mediated memories require additional empirical grounding which is contextualized, critical and mindful of the socio-technical developments and the affordances of the digital modes of communication.