Continuity and discontinuity of the past in the (auto)biographical narratives of the elites

Abstrakt

Autobiographical narrative is, by its nature, an activity based on the reflection of lived continuity at the background of discontinuity of historical dynamics. In oral history, the biographical axis of individual life merges naturally with the historical axis of political history, and both of these dimensions influence each other in several ways.

In my paper, I am exploring different ways of coping with (dis)continuity in two case studies: interviews from USC Shoah Foundation's Visual History Archive. In the context of the workshop's topic, the data shows two specific narrative strategies: (a) where continuity should be, there is none; (ii) where continuity shouldn't be, there is one.

Klíčová slova

• oral history
• biography
• narrative
• elites