Ghost heroes: Forgetting and remembering in national narratives of the past

Abstract

This article takes a sociological perspective on the phenomenon of national myth making in collective memory. It develops an original theoretical concept, the ghost hero. The ghost hero, we posit, is a reinvented historical actor who, despite being implicated in acts of moral or legal turpitude, is elevated and venerated within national communities. In building a theoretical frame, we use two historical cases: Latvian aviator and Nazi-era collaborator Herberts Cukurs, and Marshall Ion Antonescu, pro-fascist leader of Romania in World War II. Our concept draws on the microsociological theory of Erving Goffman to characterize a historical narrative as the presentation of a national “self” and the structural functionalist perspective to examine the sociological functions of the ghost hero for state and society. We suggest that the ghost hero concept could extend beyond these cases and regions to analyze the heroization of historical figures implicated in atrocities.