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CULTURAL EROSION AND CULTURAL MEMORY IN TAUFIQ RAFAT’S ARRIVAL OF THE MONSOON
Corresponding Author(s) : Farhana Tabassum
Humanities & Social Sciences Reviews,
Vol. 9 No. 3 (2021): May
Abstract
Purpose of the study: This study focuses on analyzing and locating the cultural images and the elements which present the idea of cultural erosion, and with the lens of cultural memory evokes the idea of identity, and nostalgia in Taufiq Rafat’s poetry.
Methodology: This research is qualitative in design. To explore the concepts of cultural memory and cultural erosion Purposive sampling is used for the selection of the poems. For analysis, textual and descriptive methods of analysis are used. Jan Assmann's (cultural theorist and archaeologist) theory of cultural memory serves as a theoretical framework for this study.
Main Findings: From the analysis, it is explored that Rafat’s poetry discerns the concepts of cultural erosion and cultural memory. In the majority of his poems, few dominant images are used repeatedly to strengthen the notion of memory and yearning for the past such as time (clock), the flow of time which is fleeting and nontransient. He not only laments on cultural erosion but also keeps his personal and social memories, traditions, ancient civilizations, rituals, and objects alive so that they could be transferred to the next generations to establish mnemonics.
Applications of the study: This research may be beneficial to those studying Anthropology, Culture Studies, History, South Asian Literature, and Sociology. Furthermore, the interpretation of major symbols and images related to the culture, and history which evoke cultural memory, and erosion will pave the way for the deconstruction of symbols in poetry.
The novelty of the study: Rafat’s poetry is enriched with natural and romantic images, the depiction of beauty and culture about which many studies are available. The significance of this study lies in the fact that the concept of cultural memory from his poems has been evoked and analyzed.
Keywords
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- Abbassi, Z. (2016). Cultural Memory/ Collective Memory as a way of Resistance to Traumatic. International Journal of Humanities and Cultural Studies (IJHCS), 3(1), 36-47. Retrieved from https://www.ijhcs.com/ index.php/ijhcs/article/view/1265/1128
- An, L., & Hong, F. (2019). Body • Experience • Imagination: The Collective Memory of Chinese Martial Arts. The International Journal of the History of Sports, 38(15-16). Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.108 0/09523367.2019.1620733
- Andermahr, S. (2019). Decolonizing cultural memory in Andrea Levy’s Small Island. Journal of Postcolonial Writing, 55(4), 555-569. https://doi.org/10.1080/17449855.2019.1633554 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17449855.2019.1633554
- Ascari, M. (2013). The Development of Little Poets’ Corner Between Cultural Memory and Geopolitics. Victorian Literature and Culture, 41(2), 345 - 370. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1060150312000447 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1060150312000447
- Ashcroft, B., & Ahluwalia, P. (2000). Edward Said. London and New York: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203137123
- Assmann, J. (2011). Communicative and Cultural Memory. In Cultural Memories. Knowledge and Space (Klaus Tschira Symposia) (pp. 15-27). Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-8945-8_1 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-8945-8_2
- Assmann, J., & Czaplicka, J. (1995). Collective Memory and Cultural Identity. New German Critique, 65(125), 125-133. https://doi.org/10.2307/488538 DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/488538
- Bertens, L. M. (2020). ‘Doing’ memory: performativity and cultural memory in Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller’s Alter Bahnhof Video Walk. Halaucast Studies A Journal of Culture and History, 26(2), 181-197. https://doi.org/10.1080/17504902.2019.1578454 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17504902.2019.1578454
- Brescó, I., & Wagoner, B. (2019). The psychology of modern memorials: the affective intertwining of personal and collective memories / La psicologÃa de los monumentosmodernos: la implicación afectiva de los recuerdospersonales y colectivos. Estudios de PsicologÃa / Studies in Psychology, 219-244. https://doi.org/10.1080/ 02109395.2018.1560024 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/02109395.2018.1560024
- Brill, K. (2017). Literature and Cultural Memory. Lieden: Brill Hes:De Graaf: Brill Nijhoff: Brill Rodpoi & Hotei Publishing.
- Brown, A. D., Kouri, N., & Hirst, W. (2012). Memory’s malleability: its role in shaping collective memory and social identity. Front Psychol, 3, 257. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00257 DOI: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00257
- Cheref, A. (2019). Cultural Memory and Resistance in Assia Djebar’s Vaste est la prison. Romance Studies, 37(3-4), 134-148. https://doi.org/10.1080/02639904.2019.1690788 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/02639904.2019.1690788
- Chow, P. Y. (2014). Culture as Collective Memories: An Emerging Concept in International Law and Discourse on Cultural Rights. Human Rights Law Review, 14(4), 611–646. https://doi.org/10.1093/hrlr/ngu032 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/hrlr/ngu032
- Classen, A. (2015). German Literary Historians as Guardians of Culture and Intellectual Memory? Challenges and Promises from the Past and the Present. Memory as Cultural Identity. Studia Neophilologica, 87(2), 186-201. https://doi.org/10.1080/00393274.2015.1049854 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00393274.2015.1049854
- Drozdzewski, D., Waterton, E., & Sumartojo, S. (2019). Cultural memory and identity in the context of war: Experiential, place-based and political concerns. International Review of the Red Cross, 101(910), 251-272. https://doi:10.1017/S1816383119000110 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1816383119000110
- Durkheim, É. (2008). The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd.
- Erll, A., & Nünning, A. (2008). Cultural Memory Studies: An International and Interdisciplinary Handbook. NewYork. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110207262
- Gagnepain, P., Vallée, T., Heiden, S., Decorde, M., Gauvain, J.-L., Laurent, A., . . . Eustache, F. (2019). Collective memory shapes the organization of individual memories in the medial prefrontal cortex. Nature Human Behaviour, 4, 189–200. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-019-0779-z DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-019-0779-z
- GarcÃa -Gavilanes, R., Mollgaard, A., Tsvetkova, M., & Yasseri, T. (2017). The memory remains Understanding collective memory in the digital age. Science Advances, 3(4), 1-7. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1602368
- https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1602368 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1602368
- Haux, D. H., Dominicé, A. M., & Raspotnig, J. A. (2020). A Cultural Memory of the Digital Age? Int J Semiot Law. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-020-09778-7 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-020-09778-7
- Hayat, H. (2016). Pakistaniness in Taufiq Rafat’s Selected Poems. Imperial Journal of Interdisciplinary Research (IJIR),2(9), 1638-1643. http://www.onlinejournal.in
- Hussein, F., Stephens, J., & Tiwari, R. (2020). Cultural Memories and Sense of Place in Historic Urban Landscapes: The Case of Masrah Al Salam, the Demolished Theatre Context in Alexandria, Egypt. Sustainability, 1-23. https://doi.org/10.3390/land9080264 DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/land9080264
- Larsen, S. E. (2016). Memory, Migration, and Literature. European Review, 24(4), 509 - 522. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1062798716000053 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1062798716000053
- Liao, Z., & Dai, G. (2020). Inheritance and Dissemination of Cultural Collective Memory: An Analysis of a Traditional Festival. Original Research, 10(1). https://doi.org/10.1177%2F2158244020901601 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/2158244020901601
- Mghari, N. S. (2020). The Moroccan city: a quest for cultural memory in Francophone and Arabophone contemporary literature. The Journal of North African Studies. https://doi.org/10.1080/13629387.2020.1806827 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13629387.2020.1806827
- Mansoor, A. (2012). The Notes of a New Harp: Re-Carving the self in Contemporary Pakistani Poetry in English. Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies, 4(1), 14-38
- Mohammad, Y. (2015). Reconfiguring European history and cultural memory in Jamal Mahjoub’s Travelling with Djinns. The Journal of Common Wealth Literature, 52(2), 316-330. https://doi.org/10.1177 %2F0021989415593402 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0021989415593402
- Mousavi, S. M., Pourgiv, F., & Hadaegh, B. (2018). Cultural Memory Studies and the Idea of Literature: A Cosmopolitan Critique. Journal of Human and Social Studies, 9(1), 61-121.
- N.Laland, K., & Rendell, L. (2013). Cultural Memory. Current Biology, 23(17), 736-740. https://doi.org/10.101 6/j.cub.2013.07.071 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2013.07.071
- Ortner, J. (2020). Memory between Locality and Mobility: Diaspora, Holocaust, and Exile as Reflected in Contemporary German-Jewish Literature. Studia Litergica, 50(1), 55-68. https://doi.org/10.1177% 2F0039320720906543 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0039320720906543
- Quan, Z. (2019). Cultural Memory and Ethnic Identity Construction in Toni Morrison’s A Mercy. Journal of Black Studies, 50(6), 555-568. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0021934719861268 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0021934719861268
- Rafat, T. (1985). Arrival of the Monsoon Collected Poems 1947-78. Lahore: Vanguard Book (Pvt) Ltd.
- Rafique, H., & Tabassum, F. (2021). Taufiq Rafat as an Asian Romantic: A Critical Analysis of Poetry Collection ‘Arrival of The Monsoon. Science International, 33(1), 25-30. DOI: https://doi.org/10.47205/jdss.2020(1-IV)2
- Rigney, A. (2018). Remembrance as remaking: memories of the nation revisited. Journal of the Association for thje Study for the study of Ethnicity and Nationalism, 24(2), 240-257. https://doi.org/10.1111/nana.12388 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/nana.12388
- Sell, Roger D.(2012). Cultural Memory and the Communicational Criticism of Literature. Journal for Communication Studies, 5 (10). Retrieved from https://ssrn.com/abstract=2193845
- Serrat, O. (2017). Culture Theory. In Knowledge Solutions Tools, Methods, and Approaches to Drive Organizational Performance (pp. 31-34). Cham: Springer Nature. https://sci-hub.se/10.1007/978-981-10-0983-9 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-0983-9_7
- Simine, S. A.-d. (2019). Beyond trauma? Memories of Joy and memory play in Blade Runner 2049. Memory Studies, 12(1), 61-73. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1750698018811989 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1750698018811989
- Smith, M. (2018). The historiography of kardimarkara: Reading a desert tradition as cultural memory of the remote past. Journal of Social Archeology, 19(1), 47-66. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1469605318817685 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1469605318817685
- Szoblik, K. (2020). Traces of Aztec Cultural Memory in Sixteenth-Century Songs and Chronicles: The Case of Tlacahuepan. The Americas, 77(4), 513–537. https://doi.org/10.1017/tam.2020.35 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/tam.2020.35
- Terry, J. (2013). “When the sea of living memory has recededâ€: Cultural memory and literary narratives of the Middle Passage. Memory Studies, 6(4), 474-488. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1750698012467999 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1750698012467999
- Wagoner, B. (2017). The Constructive Mind: Bartlett's Psychology in Reconstruction. Singapore: Cambridge University Press https://doi.org/10.1017/9780511920219 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9780511920219
- Wang, Q. (2011). Autobiographical Memory and Culture. Online Readings in Psychology and Culture, 5(2). https://doi.org/10.9707/2307-0919.1047 DOI: https://doi.org/10.9707/2307-0919.1047
- Zhang, B. (2016). Poetry, memory, and identity: the experience of building Asian immigrant community. Journal of Poetry Therapy, 29(1), 15-32. https://doi.org/10.1080/08893675.2016.1133083 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/08893675.2016.1133083
References
Abbassi, Z. (2016). Cultural Memory/ Collective Memory as a way of Resistance to Traumatic. International Journal of Humanities and Cultural Studies (IJHCS), 3(1), 36-47. Retrieved from https://www.ijhcs.com/ index.php/ijhcs/article/view/1265/1128
An, L., & Hong, F. (2019). Body • Experience • Imagination: The Collective Memory of Chinese Martial Arts. The International Journal of the History of Sports, 38(15-16). Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.108 0/09523367.2019.1620733
Andermahr, S. (2019). Decolonizing cultural memory in Andrea Levy’s Small Island. Journal of Postcolonial Writing, 55(4), 555-569. https://doi.org/10.1080/17449855.2019.1633554 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17449855.2019.1633554
Ascari, M. (2013). The Development of Little Poets’ Corner Between Cultural Memory and Geopolitics. Victorian Literature and Culture, 41(2), 345 - 370. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1060150312000447 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1060150312000447
Ashcroft, B., & Ahluwalia, P. (2000). Edward Said. London and New York: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203137123
Assmann, J. (2011). Communicative and Cultural Memory. In Cultural Memories. Knowledge and Space (Klaus Tschira Symposia) (pp. 15-27). Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-8945-8_1 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-8945-8_2
Assmann, J., & Czaplicka, J. (1995). Collective Memory and Cultural Identity. New German Critique, 65(125), 125-133. https://doi.org/10.2307/488538 DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/488538
Bertens, L. M. (2020). ‘Doing’ memory: performativity and cultural memory in Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller’s Alter Bahnhof Video Walk. Halaucast Studies A Journal of Culture and History, 26(2), 181-197. https://doi.org/10.1080/17504902.2019.1578454 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17504902.2019.1578454
Brescó, I., & Wagoner, B. (2019). The psychology of modern memorials: the affective intertwining of personal and collective memories / La psicologÃa de los monumentosmodernos: la implicación afectiva de los recuerdospersonales y colectivos. Estudios de PsicologÃa / Studies in Psychology, 219-244. https://doi.org/10.1080/ 02109395.2018.1560024 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/02109395.2018.1560024
Brill, K. (2017). Literature and Cultural Memory. Lieden: Brill Hes:De Graaf: Brill Nijhoff: Brill Rodpoi & Hotei Publishing.
Brown, A. D., Kouri, N., & Hirst, W. (2012). Memory’s malleability: its role in shaping collective memory and social identity. Front Psychol, 3, 257. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00257 DOI: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00257
Cheref, A. (2019). Cultural Memory and Resistance in Assia Djebar’s Vaste est la prison. Romance Studies, 37(3-4), 134-148. https://doi.org/10.1080/02639904.2019.1690788 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/02639904.2019.1690788
Chow, P. Y. (2014). Culture as Collective Memories: An Emerging Concept in International Law and Discourse on Cultural Rights. Human Rights Law Review, 14(4), 611–646. https://doi.org/10.1093/hrlr/ngu032 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/hrlr/ngu032
Classen, A. (2015). German Literary Historians as Guardians of Culture and Intellectual Memory? Challenges and Promises from the Past and the Present. Memory as Cultural Identity. Studia Neophilologica, 87(2), 186-201. https://doi.org/10.1080/00393274.2015.1049854 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00393274.2015.1049854
Drozdzewski, D., Waterton, E., & Sumartojo, S. (2019). Cultural memory and identity in the context of war: Experiential, place-based and political concerns. International Review of the Red Cross, 101(910), 251-272. https://doi:10.1017/S1816383119000110 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1816383119000110
Durkheim, É. (2008). The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd.
Erll, A., & Nünning, A. (2008). Cultural Memory Studies: An International and Interdisciplinary Handbook. NewYork. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110207262
Gagnepain, P., Vallée, T., Heiden, S., Decorde, M., Gauvain, J.-L., Laurent, A., . . . Eustache, F. (2019). Collective memory shapes the organization of individual memories in the medial prefrontal cortex. Nature Human Behaviour, 4, 189–200. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-019-0779-z DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-019-0779-z
GarcÃa -Gavilanes, R., Mollgaard, A., Tsvetkova, M., & Yasseri, T. (2017). The memory remains Understanding collective memory in the digital age. Science Advances, 3(4), 1-7. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1602368
https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1602368 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1602368
Haux, D. H., Dominicé, A. M., & Raspotnig, J. A. (2020). A Cultural Memory of the Digital Age? Int J Semiot Law. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-020-09778-7 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-020-09778-7
Hayat, H. (2016). Pakistaniness in Taufiq Rafat’s Selected Poems. Imperial Journal of Interdisciplinary Research (IJIR),2(9), 1638-1643. http://www.onlinejournal.in
Hussein, F., Stephens, J., & Tiwari, R. (2020). Cultural Memories and Sense of Place in Historic Urban Landscapes: The Case of Masrah Al Salam, the Demolished Theatre Context in Alexandria, Egypt. Sustainability, 1-23. https://doi.org/10.3390/land9080264 DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/land9080264
Larsen, S. E. (2016). Memory, Migration, and Literature. European Review, 24(4), 509 - 522. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1062798716000053 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1062798716000053
Liao, Z., & Dai, G. (2020). Inheritance and Dissemination of Cultural Collective Memory: An Analysis of a Traditional Festival. Original Research, 10(1). https://doi.org/10.1177%2F2158244020901601 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/2158244020901601
Mghari, N. S. (2020). The Moroccan city: a quest for cultural memory in Francophone and Arabophone contemporary literature. The Journal of North African Studies. https://doi.org/10.1080/13629387.2020.1806827 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13629387.2020.1806827
Mansoor, A. (2012). The Notes of a New Harp: Re-Carving the self in Contemporary Pakistani Poetry in English. Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies, 4(1), 14-38
Mohammad, Y. (2015). Reconfiguring European history and cultural memory in Jamal Mahjoub’s Travelling with Djinns. The Journal of Common Wealth Literature, 52(2), 316-330. https://doi.org/10.1177 %2F0021989415593402 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0021989415593402
Mousavi, S. M., Pourgiv, F., & Hadaegh, B. (2018). Cultural Memory Studies and the Idea of Literature: A Cosmopolitan Critique. Journal of Human and Social Studies, 9(1), 61-121.
N.Laland, K., & Rendell, L. (2013). Cultural Memory. Current Biology, 23(17), 736-740. https://doi.org/10.101 6/j.cub.2013.07.071 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2013.07.071
Ortner, J. (2020). Memory between Locality and Mobility: Diaspora, Holocaust, and Exile as Reflected in Contemporary German-Jewish Literature. Studia Litergica, 50(1), 55-68. https://doi.org/10.1177% 2F0039320720906543 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0039320720906543
Quan, Z. (2019). Cultural Memory and Ethnic Identity Construction in Toni Morrison’s A Mercy. Journal of Black Studies, 50(6), 555-568. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0021934719861268 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0021934719861268
Rafat, T. (1985). Arrival of the Monsoon Collected Poems 1947-78. Lahore: Vanguard Book (Pvt) Ltd.
Rafique, H., & Tabassum, F. (2021). Taufiq Rafat as an Asian Romantic: A Critical Analysis of Poetry Collection ‘Arrival of The Monsoon. Science International, 33(1), 25-30. DOI: https://doi.org/10.47205/jdss.2020(1-IV)2
Rigney, A. (2018). Remembrance as remaking: memories of the nation revisited. Journal of the Association for thje Study for the study of Ethnicity and Nationalism, 24(2), 240-257. https://doi.org/10.1111/nana.12388 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/nana.12388
Sell, Roger D.(2012). Cultural Memory and the Communicational Criticism of Literature. Journal for Communication Studies, 5 (10). Retrieved from https://ssrn.com/abstract=2193845
Serrat, O. (2017). Culture Theory. In Knowledge Solutions Tools, Methods, and Approaches to Drive Organizational Performance (pp. 31-34). Cham: Springer Nature. https://sci-hub.se/10.1007/978-981-10-0983-9 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-0983-9_7
Simine, S. A.-d. (2019). Beyond trauma? Memories of Joy and memory play in Blade Runner 2049. Memory Studies, 12(1), 61-73. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1750698018811989 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1750698018811989
Smith, M. (2018). The historiography of kardimarkara: Reading a desert tradition as cultural memory of the remote past. Journal of Social Archeology, 19(1), 47-66. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1469605318817685 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1469605318817685
Szoblik, K. (2020). Traces of Aztec Cultural Memory in Sixteenth-Century Songs and Chronicles: The Case of Tlacahuepan. The Americas, 77(4), 513–537. https://doi.org/10.1017/tam.2020.35 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/tam.2020.35
Terry, J. (2013). “When the sea of living memory has recededâ€: Cultural memory and literary narratives of the Middle Passage. Memory Studies, 6(4), 474-488. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1750698012467999 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1750698012467999
Wagoner, B. (2017). The Constructive Mind: Bartlett's Psychology in Reconstruction. Singapore: Cambridge University Press https://doi.org/10.1017/9780511920219 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9780511920219
Wang, Q. (2011). Autobiographical Memory and Culture. Online Readings in Psychology and Culture, 5(2). https://doi.org/10.9707/2307-0919.1047 DOI: https://doi.org/10.9707/2307-0919.1047
Zhang, B. (2016). Poetry, memory, and identity: the experience of building Asian immigrant community. Journal of Poetry Therapy, 29(1), 15-32. https://doi.org/10.1080/08893675.2016.1133083 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/08893675.2016.1133083