Week 4 - Global Mnemotechnics: Globalising Memory, Thinking and Action

Memory is an external part of our bodies, it is outside of us and so are the technologies used to store them. In order to sustain and protect our own memories, we use technologies to store and archive our personal experiences so they can be easily accessed and never forgotten. Although does increased dependence on these technologies actually make the individual lose more knowledge than we put into the equipment? What is certain is that as individuals and as collectives we all have a certain sphere, environment also know as umwelts, where we inhabit memories and habits that are an extension of us and our extended mind (Murphie 2011: 21 Mar) Although coming from different backgrounds and perceptions of the world, our umwelts can cross through shared experiences and create a commonality between one person and another.

Memory and the media have a special relationship that fuses experiences and cognitive technologies to influence events as they shift through time (Stiegler 2006) These technologies allow us to access stored memories as well as maintain them through time, preserving them for the future. From the past, in which we draw to propel us from the present into the future and our engagements with the world allows the individual to influence their future experiences (Murphie 2011: 21 Mar) From this, memory acts as not only a link from past > present > to future, but reinforces the ambiguous nature of human memory and how media can preserve this for each individual.

Most importantly, we place particular significance on hypomnesis (the extended memory which is technical) and anamnesis (the recalling of natural memory) The former is used to help deficiencies in human memory where media and technologies are used to extend it. Despite this, Stiegler places importance on mnemotechnologies as a cognitive technology serving memory (Murphie 2011: 21 Mar) It is the self conscious remixing and synthesising of our technologies to generate different results. Although there are some arguments that state more knowledge is being lost due to the use of cognitive technologies on human memory, there is no denying that media technologies transform memory and experience for every individual.

References

Murphie, A. (2011) Advanced Media Issues Lecture. 21 March.

Stiegler, B. (2006). Anamnesis and Hypomnesis. Available: http://arsindustrialis.org/anamnesis-and-hypomnesis. Last accessed 21st Mar 2011.