RECOVERED MEMORY
AND FALSE MEMORY

(page 7 of the interdisciplinary study of memory pages)

John Sutton, Philosophy Department, Macquarie University, Sydney.
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Philosophy of Memory
Social and Collective Memory


MEMORY:
Psychoanalysis, Psychiatry, Philosophy, Recovered Memory and False Memory, Trauma

1. Philosophers on 
the Debate
2. Balanced Introductory Discussions
3. Recommended Treatments
4. Recovered Memory
5. False Memory: popular
6. False Memory: detail
7. The mid-1990s Debate
8. Trauma: history and theory
9. Psychoanalysis & Memory
10. Repression
11. Bibliographies & Links
 

1. Philosophers on the Debate
* Sue Campbell, Relational Remembering: rethinking the memory wars (Rowman & Littlefield, 2003)
* Ian Hacking, ‘Memoro-politics, Trauma, & the Soul’, History of the Human Sciences 7 (1994), 29-52

* Ian Hacking, Rewriting the Soul: multiple personality and the sciences of memory
    (Princeton U.P., 1995). Covers multiple personality and dissociative identity disorder;
    child abuse; gender; truth in memory; schizophrenia; trauma; sciences of memory; mind
    and body; indeterminacy in the past. See multiple reviews with author’s response in
    Metascience 7 (1995) by Sander Gilman, Michael Kenny, Jill Morawski, Richard Ofshe, Ian
    Spence, Kathy Wilkes; in History and Theory 36 (1997), 63-82 by Barry Allen; in History of
    the Human Sciences 8 (1995), 107-130 by Peter Barham, Thomas Osborne, Michael Lynch;
    in Mind 105 (1996), 699-701 by Marya Schechtman. And see also Ian Hacking, Mad Travelers:
    reflections on the reality of transient mental illnesses (Virginia U.P., 1998).
* Andy Hamilton, 'False Memory Syndrome and the Authority of Personal Memory-Claims: a
    philosophical perspective' – this is online if your library has a MUSE subscription, via
    http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/philosophy_psychiatry_and_psychology/toc/ppp5.4.html
    or in Philosophy, Psychiatry, and Psychology 5 (1998), 283-297. Followed by commentaries by
    Stephen E. Braude, M.J. Eacott, and E.J. Lowe, and the author's response.
Owen Flanagan, ‘I Remember You’, in his Self Expressions: mind, morals, and the meaning
    of life (Oxford U.P., 1996), 88-98
Grant Gillett, ‘My Name is Legion, for We are Many’, chapter 10 in his The Mind and Its
    Discontents: an essay in discursive psychiatry (Oxford U.P., 1999) on multiple
    personality and recovered memory.

2. Balanced Introductory Discussions
* Daniel Schacter, Searching for Memory: the mind, the brain, and the past (Harper Collins,
    1996): chpater 7 on emotional memories and trauma; chapter 9 on ‘The Memory Wars’
* Susan Engel, Context is Everything: the nature of memory (Freeman, 1999), chapter 3
Paul Antze & Michael Lambek, 'Introduction: forecasting memory', in Antze & Lambek (eds),
    Tense Past: cultural essays in trauma and memory (Routledge, 1996), xi-xxxviii
Janet Jones, The Psychotherapist’s Guide to Human Memory (Basic Books, 1999)

3. Recommended Treatments
* Janice Haaken, Pillar of Salt: gender, memory, and the perils of looking back (New
    Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers U.P., 1998). See reviews by Norm Diamond in Science as Culture
    9 (2000), 419-431; by John Sutton, in Metapsychology Online Book Review (2000)
* Jeffrey Prager, Presenting the Past: psychoanalysis and the sociology of misremembering
    (Harvard U.P., 1998)
* Lectures by Jonathan Schooler and Elizabeth Loftus at the San Francisco Exploratorium
Amina Memon and Mark Young, Desperately seeking evidence: The recovered memory debate.
    CogPrints draft from Legal and Criminological Psychology 2/2 (1997), 131-154.
Ann Scott, Real Events Revisited (Virago, 1996)

4. Recovered Memory
Jennifer Freyd, Betrayal Trauma: the logic of forgetting childhood abuse (2nd edition,
    Harvard U.P., 1998)
Lenore Terr, Unchained Memories: true stories of traumatic memories (Basic Books, 1995)
Ellen Bass & Laura Davis, The Courage to Heal: a guide for women survivors of child
    sexual abuse (many editions, eg 3rd edition, Harper Perennial, 1994)
Nancy Potter, ‘Loopholes, Gaps, and What is Held Fast: democratic epistemology and claims to
    recovered memories’, Philosophy, Psychiatry, and Psychology 3 (1996), 237-254, with
    commentary by Lorraine Code
Karen Hopenwasser, ‘Listening to the Body: somatic representations of dissociated memory’, in
    L. Aron (ed.), Relational Perspectives on the Body (Analytic Press, 1998), 215-236

5. False Memory: popular
Frederick Crews, ‘The Revenge of the Repressed’, New York Review of Books XLI, nos. 19 & 20, 17
    November 1994, pp.54-60, and 1 December 1994, pp.49-58Lawrence Wright, Remembering Satan (Vintage, 1995)
Elizabeth Loftus and Katherine Ketcham, The Myth of Repressed Memory: false memories
    and allegations of sexual abuse (St. Martin’s Press, 1996)
Richard Ofshe and Ethan Watters, Making Monsters: false memories, psychotherapy, and
    sexual hysteria (Scribner’s, 1996)
Mark Pendergrast, Victims of Memory: sex abuse accusations and shattered lives (Upper
    Access Publishers, 1996)
Leslie Wilson, ‘Salem’s Lot’, London Review of Books, 23 March 1995
Martin Kottmeyer, Entirely Unpredisposed: The Cultural Background of UFO Abduction Reports (1990)
The False Memory Syndrome Foundation

6. False Memory: more detailed
Kenneth Bowers and Peter Farvolden, ‘Revisiting a Century-Old Freudian Slip: from suggestion
    disavowed to the truth repressed’, Psychological Bulletin 119 (1996), 355-380
Lorna Goldberg, ‘A Psychoanalytic Look at Recovered Memories, Therapists, Cult Leaders, and
    Undue Influence’, Clinical Social Work Journal 25 (1997), 71-86
Elizabeth Loftus, 'Memory Distortion and False Memory Creation', CogPrints draft from
    Bulletin of the American Academy of Psychiatry and Law 24(3) (1996):281-295.
Kenneth S. Pope, 'Memory, Abuse, and Science: Questioning Claims about the False Memory
    Syndrome Epidemic', American Psychologist, 51/9, (Sept 1996), 957-974: in the same
    journal vol. 52/9 (Sept. 1997), there are a number of commentaries on this paper (eg by
    Pamela Freyd, Mark Pendergrast, John Kihlstrom), with Pope’s responses.
Nicholas P. Spanos, Multiple Identities and False Memories: a sociocognitive perspective
    (American Psychological Association, 1996).

7. The mid-1990s Debate: academic coverage
* Martin Conway (ed), Recovered Memories and False Memories (Oxford U.P., 1997):
    especially Conway’s introduction, and the papers by Kihlstrom and by Schooler et al
Kathy Pezdek & William Banks (eds), The Recovered Memory/ False Memory Debate
    (Academic Press, 1996); especially Tessler & Nelson, Howe & Courage, and Fivush on
    children’s memory; John Kihlstrom on trauma and memory; Laura Brown on the history
    of the debate; and reports from American and British Psychological Associations.
Paul Appelbaum, Lisa Uyehara, & Mark Elin (eds), Trauma and Memory: clinical and legal
    controversies (Oxford U.P., 1997)
Joseph Sandler and Peter Fonagy (eds), Recovered Memories of Abuse: true or false?
    (International Universities Press, 1997); interesting documenting of a controversial
    conference in London in 1994, contributors include Larry Weiskrantz, Alan Baddeley, Susie
    Orbach, includes reports of general discussion and questions
Shelley M. Park, 'False Memory Syndrome: A Feminist Philosophical Approach', Hypatia 12/2 (1997), 1-50
Sue Campbell, 'Women, False Memory, and Personal Identity', Hypatia 12/2 (1997), 51-83
Valerie Sinason (ed) Memory in Dispute (Karnac Books, 1998)
Journal Special Issue: Consciousness and Cognition 3, nos.3/4 (1994)

8. Trauma: history and theory
Ruth Leys, ‘Traumatic Cures: shell shock, Janet, and the question of memory’, Critical Inquiry 20
    (1994), 623-662; shorter version in P. Antze & M. Lambek (eds), Tense Past: cultural essays
    in trauma and memory (London: Routledge, 1996), 103-145
Ruth Leys, Trauma: a genealogy (Chicago U.P., 2000)
Cathy Caruth (ed.), Trauma: explorations in memory (Johns Hopkins U.P., 1995)
Michael Kenny, 'Trauma, Time, Illness, and Culture: an anthropological approach to traumatic memory',
    in P. Antze & M. Lambek (eds), Tense Past: cultural essays in trauma and memory (London:
    Routledge, 1996), 151-171
Allen Young, 'Bodily Memory and Traumatic Memory', in P. Antze & M. Lambek (eds), Tense
    Past: cultural essays in trauma and memory (London: Routledge, 1996), 89-102

9. Psychoanalysis & Memory
Sigmund Freud, Project for A Scientific Psychology (1895), in The Standard Edition …,
    vol.1. And see K. Pribram & M. Gill, Freud’s 'Project' Reassessed (Basic Books, 1986)
Sigmund Freud, ‘Remembering, Repeating, and Working Through’
Sigmund Freud, ‘Mourning and Melancholia’
Sigmund Freud, ‘A Note Upon the Mystic Writing Pad’ (1925), in …
* David Farrell Krell, Of Memory, Reminiscence, and Writing: on the verge (Indiana U.P.,
    1990), chapter 3
Jacques Derrida, ‘Freud and the Scene of Writing’, in Writing and Difference (Routledge, 1978)
Jacques Derrida, Archive Fever: a Freudian impression (Chicago U.P., 1996)
Jean-Philippe Antoine, ‘The Art of Memory and its Relation to the Unconscious’, Comparative
    Civilizations Review 18 (1988), 1-21
Steen Larsen, ‘Remembering and the Archaeology Metaphor’,
John Forrester, ‘In the Beginning was Repetition: on inversions and reversals in psychoanalytic
    time’, Time and Society 1 (1992), 287-300
Frederick Crews, Memory Wars : Freud's Legacy in Dispute (Granta Books, 1997)
Jeffrey Masson, The Assault on Truth: Freud’s suppression of the seduction theory (Pocket
    Books reprint, 1998): and see Janet Malcolm, In the Freud Archives (Knopf, 1984).
Allen Esterson, 'Jeffrey Masson and Freud's Seduction Theory: a new fable based on old myths',
     History of the Human Sciences 11 (1998), 1-21 and also here
Allen Esterson, 'The Myth of Freud's Ostracism by the Medical Community in 1896-1905:
    Jeffrey Masson's assault on truth', History of Psychology 5 (2002), 115-134. and also here

10. Repression
Matthew H. Erdelyi, ‘Repression: the mechanism and the defense’, in D. Wegner & D.
    Pennebaker (eds), Handbook of Mental Control (Prentice-Hall, 1993), 126-148

11. Bibliographies and Links
The Memory Debate Archives
‘Recovered/Repressed/False Memory’ is part of Christian Perring’s
Philosophy of Psychiatry Bibliography
Web Resources on Repression and Recovered Memories by Hugh Miller & Pauline Williams (1997).
Philip Coons' Repressed Memory Debate bibliography, by a past president of the International Society for
    the Study of Dissociation. Covers about 1993-1998.

The 'Jane Doe' case
Elizabeth Loftus and Melvin J.Guyer, 'Who Abused Jane Doe? The Hazards of the Single Case Study:
   part l' and 'part 2', Skeptical Inquirer, May/June 2002 and July 2002.

Carol Tavris, 'The High Cost of Skepticism', Skeptical Inquirer, July/August 2002:
"Here's what happened
    to two scientists who believed that tenure and the First Amendment would protect their rights to free inquiry."
'UCI Professor Faces Pending Lawsuit', Jamie Claridad, April 7, 2003, UC Irvine New University News
Elizabeth Loftus' website, with link to her full old website at University of Washington


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Last updated 6 November 2006.
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