Feeling Memory: Remembering Wartime Childhoods in France

During World War II, children in France experienced a range of emotions, from fear and anxiety to joy and resilience. Feeling Memory explores the oral narratives of a hundred people to understand the variety of experiences children had during the war, highlighting the centrality of emotion to memory. The book covers different locations and situations, including well-off and poor children, those separated from their families, and Jewish children. It argues for the transformative potential of affect theory and affective methodologies in oral history and the history of everyday life.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 400 pages
Publication date: 04 July 2023
Publisher: Columbia University Press

Feeling Memory is an affective exploration of children's lives in wartime France and the ways they are remembered. Lindsey Dodd draws on the recorded oral narratives of a hundred people to examine the variety of experiences children had during the war. She considers different aspects of remembering, underscoring the centrality of emotion to memory. This book covers a wide range of locations—the country and the city, Occupied France and the Free Zone—and situations—well-off and poor children, those separated from their families and those with them; it places Jewish children's experiences alongside non-Jewish children's. Against the backdrop of momentous events, readers encounter children playing, working, eating, thinking, doing, and feeling.

An investigation of the emotions of history, Feeling Memory argues for the transformative potential of affect theory and affective methodologies in oral history and the history of everyday life. This book makes major contributions to the history of France during World War II, understandings of children's lives in war, and the use of memory in historical and oral history analysis.

Weight: 598g
Dimension: 151 x 235 x 31 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780231209199