Erasing the Brown Scare : Referential Afterlife and the Power of Memory Templates

摘要: Perhaps paradoxically, events can have effects despite having been "forgotten." Events have, in Erving Goffman's (1981:46) phrase, a referential afterlife , the period which be referred to with expectation that audiences will understand their relevance and symbolic meaning. When an event has passed this of shared recollection it still may leave traces, especially if responses institutionalized. We examine dynamics by serve as memory templates for subsequent events. distinguish into two subtypes: interpretative action templates, those contribute how public recalls past provide strategies action. To power we analyze forgetting brown scare early 1940s, specifically largest sedition case American history, United States v. McWilliams . Attacks on right contributed development national security state courtroom tactics political trials, but rarely remembers them.