2. specific set of topics—including cognitive dissonance, attribution errors, and minority influ-
ence—whereas cognitive psychology is defined in terms of a different set of topics—including
language, attention, and memory. Based on such definitions, the topic of social remembering may
seem a hybrid thing, infelicitous and possibly sterile, uniting in a rather problematic way disparate
elements of social psychology and cognitive psychology (see Moscovici, 1983, for a different ap-
proach to defining social psychology).
To many cognitive psychologists, conceiving of remembering as social behavior, and of the
science of memory as encompassing communicative acts, may seem impertinent. Cognitive psy-
chology has a characteristic way of viewing questions related to memory, which is (in brief) to
study memory as a psychological function that is best analyzed in the laboratory, where extrane-
ous variables can be controlled, rather than in the natural settings where social interactions nor-
mally take place. Many experimental psychologists have made this argument, for example, Banaji
and Crowder (1989, p. 1192), who argued, “the more complex a phenomenon, the greater the need
to study it under controlled conditions, and the less it ought to be studied in its natural complex-
ity.” Viewed from the perspective of these psychologists, the science of memory has more in com-
mon with neurology than with anthropology. Yet, in the discussion that follows, I will argue for
the usefulness of conceptualizing remembering as social behavior, and for expanding the science
of memory to include communicative acts.
Over the past several years, my colleagues and I have been conducting studies of conversa-
tional remembering (Manier, 1997; see also Hirst & Manier, 1996, 2002; Hirst, Manier, &
Apetroaia, 1997; Manier, Pinner, & Hirst, 1996). These studies demonstrate that, in naturalistic
contexts, when groups such as families engage in conversations about the past, they tend to orga-
nize their interactions in such a way that particular group members take special responsibility for
narrating, that is, telling the story about the past event. In other words, group members adopt con-
versational roles, either as narrators or as nonnarrators. Who takes what role has consequences for
what is said in the group recounting, especially in relation to the unique recollections of particular
individuals, with narrators introducing more of their unique recollections into the group recount-
ing than nonnarrators. Most recently, our research group has found evidence that even one single
group conversation of this sort can have measurable effects on the subsequent recollections of in-
dividual group members, leading their individual recollections toward conformity with that of the
narrator in the group (Manier, Hirst, & Cuc, 2003).
The research that my colleagues and I have been undertaking certainly tells us something about
conversations, but does it tell us something about memory? My argument is that it does, but it is
not clear that this point would be conceded by all. For example, Tulving (2002, p. 20) recently an-
nounced that memory
has a home, even if still a hidden one, in the brain. … An event happens, a person experiences it, mem-
ory traces are laid down representing the event, the past vanishes and is replaced by the present. The
memory traces of the event continue to exist in the present, they are retrieved, and the person remem-
bers the event. This, in a nutshell, … [is] how memory works.
Tulving, who is a preeminent authority on the psychology of memory, clearly locates memory in
the brain. But does this description of memory leave room for the kinds of social processes that my
colleagues and I have studied under the rubric of conversational remembering? Does it even leave
room for the kind of research undertaken decades ago by Bartlett (1932/1995)? Perhaps it does (see
252 MANIER
3. Tulving, 1991). Nevertheless, emphasizing the importance of finding memory’s “home … in the
brain” leads to a research program oriented toward discovering modules associated with brain or-
ganization and cognitive function (see Geary & Huffman, 2002). As long as experimental psychol-
ogists are oriented toward discovering such modules, they are less likely to undertake (or even to
value) the analysis of acts of remembering as they take place in naturally occurring sociocultural
contexts, such as conversations between family members.
At first dint, we might suppose that the belief that memory has a “home, even if a still hidden
one, in the brain” has arisen as a consequence of recent discoveries in the field of neuroscience. In
fact, to an extent that sometimes goes unrecognized, this way of viewing memory has deep histori-
cal roots. It will be worthwhile, then, to provide a brief review of the prehistory of the contempo-
rary conception of memory before proceeding further.
HISTORICAL ORIGINS OF FACULTY PSYCHOLOGY
The systematic study of memory has a long history, with origins at least as old as Ancient Greece.
Yates (1966) provided an informative account of the origins of mnemonic techniques in the An-
cient period, tracing the beginnings of what has come to be known as the method of loci. But her fo-
cus is on mnemonics, not on memory per se; few thorough histories of the ways that scholars have
approached memory down through the ages exist (but see Barash, 1997; Carruthers, 1993;
Draaisma, 2000; Herrmann & Chaffin, 1988; Marshall & Fryer, 1978). The discussion that follows
is no more than an introduction to one strand of that history.
It is interesting to note that, for one of the earliest philosophers to concern himself with mem-
ory, conversations played an important role. For Plato (trans. 1991), memory was fundamental to
any act of knowing. According to what Cropsey (1995) called the Socratic “obstetrical metaphor,”
the purpose of philosophy is to serve as a “midwife” to the birth of ideas having germinal exis-
tence within the soul; in this sense, Plato saw knowing as involving an act of remembering. Thus,
memory for Plato was not simply a brain function, or a function of any other part of the body, but
rather more like a journey, a quest in which conversations with a philosopher, a lover of wisdom,
can play a crucial role.
With Aristotle, the study of memory took a turn toward an emphasis on taxonomy. He saw
the soul as being divided into four fundamental faculties: the nutritive, the sensory, the locomo-
tive, and the rational. Aristotle (trans. 1930) viewed memory as an imagination-based aspect of
the primary sense faculty, which perceives the passage of time. Memory, then, is a mental state
in which one perceives an image or likeness of something that has been seen, felt, or thought
before.
Aristotle did not refer to memory as a faculty, and in any case his concept of faculty (dunamos)
has been widely misunderstood. Perhaps a better translation than faculty is potential—put simply,
Aristotle held that to be able to sense an object, the soul must have within it the potential to sense
this object. Herein lies the historical origin of faculty psychology. But Aristotle explicitly denied
that faculties were separable parts of the soul. Aristotle sedulously differentiated what is separable
in thought or theory from what is separable in space—he considered the faculties that he spoke of
to be theoretically distinct but not separable in space or location. Those who later drew on his
thought were not always so perspicuous and precise. In the Middle Ages, Aquinas and others who
elaborated on Aristotle described in detail the various faculties of the soul. Even Empiricists, such
IS MEMORY IN THE BRAIN? 253
4. as Locke (1689/1997), presupposed the existence of what they called “natural faculties,” such as
perception, understanding, and memory.
The philosopher most frequently associated with faculty psychology, however, is Thomas
Reid (1785/2002, 1788/1977). In his philosophical essays, Reid defined what he considered to be
the faculties or “intellectual powers” of the mind (including perception, judgment, and memory).
Reid’s version of faculty psychology influenced Gall and Spurzheim, who were the founders of
what came to be called phrenology. Spurzheim (1832) and Gall (1810) elaborated the perspective
that mental faculties were differently localized in the brain. (Although the mental faculties enu-
merated by Gall and Spurzheim did not include memory, Gall’s early research was inspired by his
observation that people with prominent eyes tended to have good memories—see Boring, 1929;
Fodor, 1989).
Fechner (1860/1966) turned from the anatomical theories of Gall and Spurzheim toward an at-
tempt to formulate a universal law, when he declared that an increase of bodily energy leads to a
corresponding increase in mental intensity. On this foundation, Fechner based his study of
psychophysics (which influenced the memory research performed by Ebbinghaus, 1885/1964;
see Bartlett, 1932/1995, p. 2). And, although William James (1890/1950) famously tried to lay
Fechner to rest, the ghost of this polymath proto-psychologist still haunts cognitive neuroscience
today (see Cacioppo & Tassinary, 1990).
CONTEMPORARY ACCOUNTS OF HUMAN MEMORY
The doctrine that the mind is composed of faculties, corresponding to localized brain functions
whose effects can be precisely measured, has been very influential in the history of psychology
(and philosophy, see Fodor, 1989) up to the present time. This viewpoint, sometimes called modu-
lar or topographical, has been reinforced in different ways by the dominant metaphors and tropes
that continue to shape discourse in experimental psychology. Often, the metaphors have been in-
fluenced by discussions of anatomy and physiology (the structure and function of the body being a
preeminent metaphor for the structure and function of the mind, with the “mental organ” of lan-
guage production—discussed by Chomsky, 1975—being only the most well-known example).
Moreover, the industrial revolution, with its production of heavy machinery, lent weight to an em-
phasis on metaphors about psychological “mechanisms.”
The development of computers spawned a host of new metaphors for cognitive psychology
(see Roediger, 1980), including information processing, hardware and software, systems and sub-
systems, control processes, input and output, the computational architecture of mind, parallel dis-
tributed processing, and numerous concepts from the arena of artificial intelligence (e.g., White,
1989). Neisser (1976) articulated the fundamental principle of the information processing ap-
proach when he maintained that the task of cognitive psychology is to trace the flow of informa-
tion in the human mind from the stage of input to that of output. Prior to the cognitive revolution
(cf. Hirst & Manier, 1995), behaviorism had envisioned psychology as the science of behavior,
consisting in observations about how stimuli (input) led to responses (output). Neisser and
like-minded others (see the discussion in Bruner, 1990) argued that the information processing
approach could penetrate the “black box” postulated by B. F. Skinner (1957).
Although terminology varies from one scholar to the next, the modular or topographical ap-
proach (supported by information processing theories) underlies much of contemporary cognitive
254 MANIER
5. psychology, for example, the model of human memory originally proposed by Atkinson and
Shiffrin (1969). These authors maintained that memory can be divided into three separate subsys-
tems—sensory register, short-term store, and long-term store—each with distinctive characteris-
tics. Other attempts to divide human memory into separate subsystems include Tulving’s (1983)
semantic–episodic distinction, Cohen and Squire’s (1980) procedural–declarative distinction, and
Schacter’s (1990) implicit–explicit distinction. (For recent reviews of the systems approach to
memory, see Barnard, 1999; Bowers & Marsolek, 2003; Foster & Jelicic, 1999; Schacter &
Tulving, 1994; Squire & Schacter, 2002).
Mental topography, which has sometimes been lampooned as “boxology,” has had its critics
(see Lyons, 2001). For example, Craik and Lockhart (1972) argued that the evidence marshaled
by Atkinson and Shiffrin (1969) in favor of separate memory mechanisms could all be explained
by one unitary memory, functioning better or worse depending on the “level of processing” in-
volved in the remembering. So, for example, when we are oriented toward remembering mean-
ingful (semantic) aspects of material, we tend to remember the material better than when we are
oriented toward remembering superficial (e.g., orthographic) aspects. Hirst (1989) also argued
that the procedural–declarative and implicit–explicit distinctions might be better explained in
terms of connections elaborated over the course of real time, rather than processing undertaken by
separate cognitive subsystems.
Debates between advocates of boxology and proponents of more processing oriented per-
spectives continue today (see Bowers & Marsolek, 2003; Foster & Jelicic, 1999). Up to a point,
empirical evidence will help to resolve these debates. Yet the disagreements at stake here may
ride (at least in part) on differences in the interpretation of experimental data, as well as differ-
ences in philosophical perspective (e.g., regarding what counts as evidence). There is no guar-
antee that consensus can ever be reached on how best to construe the relevant experimental
findings. It is not, in any case, within the scope of this article to forecast the outcome of these
ongoing debates.
Beyond the empirical debates, a fundamental challenge to the topographical view comes from
a theoretical perspective. During the past two decades, Neisser (1982) has been one of the main
champions of this line of argument. Neisser has asserted that the emphasis on differentiating
mechanisms, systems, and subsystems has (at least in some instances) led us astray from under-
standing how memory actually works in the “real world.” His call for ecological validity asserts
the imperative of understanding “everyday thinking” rather than the study (preferred by many ex-
perimental psychologists) of how isolated individuals perform on contrived experiments con-
ducted in carefully controlled laboratory settings. Neisser has argued that the gap between
everyday thinking and the controlled laboratory experiment is very difficult to bridge (see also
Hirst & Manier, 1995). The symbolic representations we form and use in our everyday thinking
are extraordinarily complex in their origins and features. Like Bartlett (1932/1995), Neisser
(1982) argued that symbols must be interpreted in terms of the characteristic responses of the so-
cial group from which they originate.
When our focus is on everyday thinking, the apparent importance of cognitive “boxes” is likely
to diminish. The Aristotelian impulse to categorize and classify, to generate a taxonomy, tends to
miss the dynamic aspects of phenomenological experience. At times, cognitive psychology’s em-
phasis on memory subsystems seems oblivious to the timeworn debate between structuralism and
functionalism. Certainly when we choose to focus on the processes that comprise everyday think-
ing, a functionalist perspective affords certain distinct advantages. It seems that Tulving (1991),
IS MEMORY IN THE BRAIN? 255
6. as well as Banaji and Crowder (1991), may (at least under the pressure of critics) be willing to con-
cede this point.
Memory (and most especially what Schacter calls explicit memory) is not an automatic func-
tion, mechanically performed when a latch on a particular box is triggered. It is not a substance ex-
creted by the thalamus or the hippocampus or any other putative “memory organ.” Although such
mechanistic metaphors may have advantages for some purposes, it is important to bear in mind
that remembering is an “act of meaning” (see Bruner, 1990). For some purposes, it may be rele-
vant to think of memory as an “output” secondary to some antecedent “input,” but more generally,
memory is something that we as humans do, that is, it is a meaningful action we perform in the
sociocultural contexts that we take part in creating, and within which we live. (This is not a
one-way process: We generate sociocultural settings with our communicative actions, just as
much as those communicative actions are themselves influenced by their settings—see Bartlett,
1932/1995.)
As an example, suppose that a friend urges you to recall an experience that you shared with her,
and you comply. What is the nature of this experience you are having? Is it an automatic response
performed in response to a particular stimulus? No. Instead, the phenomenological experience of
remembering involves a host of subtle and inextricably intertwined elements, including (in this
case) the following: (a) the nature of your relationship with your friend; (b) your general mood
and state of alertness; (c) whether the past event she mentioned has ongoing significance in your
life; (d) whether the past event has been incorporated into personal narratives you have con-
structed and told to others (or kept to yourself); and (e) whether (or, more likely, in what myriad
ways) this experience plays a part in the broader sociocultural settings in which you live.
Of course, a number of neurophysiological matters will play a role as well—most importantly,
whether your brain has been damaged or not. No doubt the proper functioning of the thalamus, the
hippocampus, and the amygdala can come into play, as well as various parts of the cortex, includ-
ing perhaps the visual cortex (if you find yourself visualizing the past event). In fact, it might be
easier to list the parts of the brain that would be irrelevant to a memory experience such as this
than it would be to list the parts putatively responsible for it. But that does not mean that the mem-
ory has a “home, even if a still hidden one, in the brain.” If it is correct to say that memory is some-
thing we do rather than something we have, it may be more appropriate to think of remembering as
a kind of cognitive behavior—a term that has something in common with the way that early cogni-
tive psychologists described themselves as “subjective behaviorists” (see Miller, Galanter, &
Pribram, 1960). In fact, when Bartlett (1932/1995) titled his seminal work Remembering, rather
than Memory, he had in mind this sort of emphasis on activity, rather than brain function.
The subject–verb–object structure of our language may in part be responsible for a mistaken
reification of memory, that is, a tendency to think of memory as a distinct object, a self-subsistent
“faculty” whose properties can best be learned in isolation from complicating variables, such as
meaning. This property of our language may point us in the wrong direction, down the road taken
by Ebbinghaus (1885/1964) in his research that employed what he called “nonsense syllables.”
Having subjects memorize consonant–vowel–consonant trigrams that have no meaning in the
English language, such as B–E–W, Ebbinghaus sought to uncover the “raw material” of memory
by stripping away the superfluous accretions of meaning and social context (see Hirst & Manier,
1995). In fact, though, later researchers argued that Ebbinghaus’s efforts were (at least in part)
misguided, because the attempt to “make meaning” of our experience is such a fundamental part
of human nature (see Bartlett, 1932/1995; Kintsch, 1985). When we are exposed to an ambiguous
256 MANIER
7. stimulus, such as the B–E–W trigram, we usually strive to see some meaning in it, such as the mir-
ror image of the word WEB, or the beginning of the word BEWILDER. Even when we look at ut-
terly vague and shapeless stimuli, such as clouds, we tend to see them (and subsequently to
remember them) as having a shape like a camel, a back like a weasel, or perhaps, looking very like
a whale. (A similar point was made by Bartlett, 1932/1995, pp. 14 ff.)
Whenwespeakoftheimportanceofmeaningtoremembering,wearerecognizingtheessentially
situated character of memory behavior (see Lave, 1991; Hutchins & Palen, 1997). This is what
Bruner (1990, p. 105) has referred to as transactional contextualism, which he described as a theo-
retical perspective that denies that human behavior must be explained from the “inside out—by re-
ferring only to intrapsychic dispositions, traits, learning capacities, motives or whatever.” Bruner
insistedthatbehaviormustbeunderstoodasbeingsituatedinaparticularsocioculturalcontext,and
as involving a particular set of interpersonal relationships. This may be very obvious when the be-
haviorwearediscussingis(forexample)thejobthatonedoesforaliving.Noonewouldconceiveof
theactofdoingone’sjobasbeingthesimpleproductoftheoperationofaphysiologicalmechanism,
even though physiological functions need to take place in order for us to be able to do our jobs. But
memory,thewaythatmanypsychologistsconceiveofit,seemstobedifferent:Memoryseemstobe
something that the brain does, or perhaps a faculty that we humans have because we have brains.
More particularly, memory seems to be the result of the healthy functioning of particular regions of
the brain, especially certain portions of the limbic system.
Of course, remembering is (in a way) the product of a healthy functioning brain, just as sex is
(in a way) the product of healthy functioning genitalia. And just as it is important to understand
how genitalia work if we are to understand sex, it is also important to understand how the brain
works if we are to understand memory. But it is no more the case that we will understand memory
adequately simply by understanding the brain than it is the case that we will understand sexuality
adequately simply by understanding genitalia.
REMEMBERING AS SOCIAL BEHAVIOR
As discussed previously, many psychologists still view memory, if not as a faculty, then at least as
something in the brain—a species of mental representation. The remembering that takes place in
everyday life, for example, in our conversations with others, would seem to be something quite dif-
ferent. Conversational remembering (Manier, 1997; see also Edwards & Middleton, 1986, 1988;
Middleton & Edwards, 1990) would seem to some psychologists to entail what one says, but not
what one really remembers. (From the perspective of such psychologists, Plato’s conception of the
philosophic conversation as playing a crucial role in memory must seem absurd.) The opinion for
which I argue here, on the contrary, is that remembering can be viewed as an act of communication.
When this view was proposed to a cognitive psychologist friend, he responded, “What of lying?”
His rather astute implication was that what we remember is one thing and what we say is something
else, and there is no reason to assume that they overlap.
However, my reply to this objection is that lying is not remembering. They have in common
that they are both acts of communication and both can be uttered aloud to someone else or silently
to oneself. But if you are lying, you are not remembering. Remembering (as the word is com-
monly used) implies an act of recalling something from the past, whether the recalling is accurate
or not—accuracy is not the criterion here, yet a deliberate lie cannot be called an act of remember-
IS MEMORY IN THE BRAIN? 257
8. ing. It is possible to remember something silently, and then subsequently to lie aloud. But that
does not imply that an act of recounting past events aloud to someone else does not count as re-
membering, just as surely as an act of silently recounting past events to oneself.
The position that I am arguing for here owes something to the philosopher Gilbert Ryle. Ryle
(1949) argued against the tendency to view silent thoughts as somehow real thoughts, as opposed
to the thoughts that we speak aloud. He posed the question: Why is it that silent (private) thinking
is taken to be real thinking, whereas spoken (public) thinking is discounted as something other
than thinking? Both acts, whether silent or spoken, whether private or public, involve thinking,
and one need not engage in an act of private thinking before later going on to engage in a separate
act of public thinking: Public (spoken) thinking is thinking. This does not imply that all thought is
verbal thought (any more than all communication is verbal communication). But it does mean that
speaking is (in a certain sense) a kind of thinking. By the same token, not all remembering is ver-
bal. Yet I would offer this definition: Remembering is a present communication of something past.
This communication need not be verbal (although often it will be, given the human propensity to-
ward language). Nevertheless, silently remembering something to oneself need not be the stan-
dard against which all other remembering is judged. Public, spoken remembering is just as much
real remembering as private, silent remembering.
I would like to illustrate this with an example (see Manier, 1997). Suppose it is Christmastime,
and I am alone in my room remembering the Christmas that I spent last year with Bettina. I recall
that we went to Zermatt to go skiing. On Christmas Day, we took the cable cars to the highest point
we could reach on the Matterhorn. Once there, we decided to walk around and enjoy the view
rather than ski down. We were struck by the contrast between the cloudless blue sky, the brilliant
white snow, and the ebony ravens that swooped down looking for food. I try to remember more,
but cannot call anything else to mind. Call this Memory A.
Feeling lonely, I walk out to a nearby cafe. There I encounter Bettina, and she asks me if I re-
member last Christmas. Slowly I feel myself smiling, and I tell her of my memory of how we went
to a little chalet near the Klein Matterhorn and drank coffee while I composed a poem comparing
her skin to the snow, her eyes to the sky, and her hair to the ravens. I finish my story expecting her
to respond in like manner. Call this story Memory B.
Bettina frowns, says good-bye, and leaves. I sit for a while, racking my brain, trying to recall
whether there is something that I may have forgotten about last Christmas. Later that evening, I
write in my journal about the events of the day and do my best to write also about what happened
last Christmas. After I finish writing I look at what I have written. Looking at Bettina’s name, I
find my hand slowly approaching the page: I strike out Bettina’s name and replace it with the
name “Petra.” Call this journal entry Memory C.
Which, then, is my “real” memory of the events of last Christmas: A, B, or C? Or perhaps
someone will choose Memory D, the memory that I silently recount to myself after I write the
journal entry. Suppose, then, that as soon as I write Petra’s name, I call her, and she denies ever
visiting Zermatt. Sure you have, I insist, and tell her the whole story with the poem about the
snow, the sky, and the ravens. Still she denies it. After my phone conversation with Petra, I am
completely confused. Which is the real memory then?
My point, of course, is that although all of these are examples of my remembering last Christ-
mas, no one of them merits the title of “my memory of last Christmas” more than any other.
Whether I am sitting alone in my room thinking silently, talking to Bettina, writing in my journal,
or talking to Petra, I am remembering last Christmas.
258 MANIER
9. For some, however, the stubborn belief remains: Behind all these concrete examples of remem-
bering, somewhere in what Ryle might call the shadowy depths of my mind, is the real memory. I
could access it, if only the circumstances were right. (Perhaps if I were in a cognitive psychology
lab?)Thebeliefinsucharealmemory,lurkingsomewherebehindthescenes,ismisguided:Thereis
no real memory that hides behind particular acts of remembering. Memory is nothing but acts of re-
membering.Granted,anactofrememberingatTimeXmightbe(insomeways)moreaccuratethan
anactofrememberingatTimeY.ButthisdoesnotmeanthattheactatTimeXistherealmemoryand
the act at Time Y is not. Both are acts of remembering. Perhaps we might say that somewhere in the
brain, underlying the acts of remembering at Time X and Time Y, is the “potential memory.” Then
wewouldbeledtosaythattherealmemoryisthepotentialmemory.Thisisreminiscentofthemedi-
evalist conception of Aristotle: Behind every act of remembering is a potential out of which the act
arises.Thenwhereisthispotential?Inthebrain?Andifthereissomethinginthebrain,independent
of behaviors that arise out of it, how are we supposed to know anything about it?
The only way to know what such a potential memory might be is through observing particular
acts of remembering. A potentiality without an actuality is nothing, or at least nothing that we can
know anything about. Granted, underlying any particular act of remembering there is a configura-
tion of parts of the brain that makes this particular act of remembering possible. But this
neurophysiological configuration is not an abstract potential memory: It is only the material basis
for real acts of remembering.
We humans engage in acts of remembering of a certain sort because we have brains of a certain
sort. But the brain, or a particular configuration of neurons within the brain, is not a potential
memory, any more than a bird’s wing is a “potential flight.” Wings of a certain sort make it possi-
ble for birds to fly, and brains of a certain sort make it possible for humans to remember. But mem-
ory is not in the brain any more than flight is in the wing. Without a brain, a human could not
remember, just as without a wing a bird could not fly. But wings are not the only body parts that
birds use in flying, and brains are not the only body parts that humans use in remembering.
To be sure, remembering can take place in silent thoughts—in that sense it is unlike flying. But
remembering, and thinking in general, can also take place in acts of speech, or even in other non-
verbal acts, such as dancing, playing tennis, or painting. These overt acts of remembering, as we
may call them, are acts of remembering as surely as what we may call covert or silent acts of re-
membering. We should not depend on what Ryle would call “ghostly processes” or “occult
causes” of overt acts of remembering, as if behind every overt act there must be a simultaneous (or
slightly antecedent) covert act. Whether overt or covert, both are acts of remembering. It is not as
if the brain were doing something silently and then this silent something causes us to speak. The
speaking itself is thinking; the speaking itself is remembering. Humans need brains as well as
mouths to remember orally, just as birds need brains as well as wings to fly. I can also use my
mouth to speak nonsense or to lie, as birds can also use their wings to shelter their young. But
when I use my mouth in an act of conversational remembering, that is remembering every bit as
much as when I am remembering in silent thought. They are different, that is, individual remem-
bering is not the same thing as social remembering, because individual remembering can take
place silently and does not require the physical presence of others (although even individual re-
membering is never entirely divorced from social context, as was persuasively argued by
Halbwachs, 1950/1980). Even so, both are acts of remembering.
The case with skills (what Cohen & Squire, 1980, called procedural memory) is rather
straightforward: When I ride a bicycle some scholars might still imagine that there are what Ryle
IS MEMORY IN THE BRAIN? 259
10. (1949) might call “shadowy harbingers” or “ghostly processes” or “occult causes” that somehow
constitute the real skill of bicycle riding. But common sense leads people to accept that bicycle
riding happens in the external world, not in the brain. There is of course a neurological aspect to
skills like bicycle riding, but that neurological aspect is not in itself the real bicycle riding; it is not
separate from or even antecedent to the performance of the skill. The brain is part of the perfor-
mance of the bicycle-riding skill, as are the arms and legs. We can perhaps imagine riding a bicy-
cle in our solitary recollections, but no one would claim that such acts of imagination constitute
the real skill of bicycle riding, as opposed to that messy, overt kind of bicycle riding that actually
depends on the vulgar presence of a bicycle.
With communicative activities such as conversation, however, the case appears (to some) to be
different. Talking about the past with another person does not seem to be real remembering of the
past: It is but a simulacrum of the real thing, which takes place in the brain. And of course in one
sense those who think this way have a point. Remembering other than the exercise of skills can
take place silently, whereas practicing the skill of bicycle riding requires actually having a bicy-
cle. But it would be incorrect to view the neuronal activity associated with acts of silent remem-
bering as the real remembering, of which verbal reports can be at best an outward manifestation.
Acts of silent remembering are associated with certain patterns of neuronal activity, and acts of
conversational remembering are associated with different patterns of neuronal activity. But an act
of conversational remembering does not depend on an antecedent act of silent remembering, ei-
ther neuronally or phenomenologically.
This view of acts of remembering accords with the concept of distributed cognition, according
to which we humans use the cultural tools that are available to us (see Hollan, Hutchins, & Kirsh,
2000; Hutchins, 1990, 1994, 1995; Hutchins & Palen, 1997; Wertsch, 1991, 1995, 1998). As
Dennett (1998) announced (citing an unpublished observation made by Bo Dahlbom and
Lars-Erik Janlert), we no more think with our bare brains than we hammer with our bare hands.
And one of the important cultural tools we use in our thinking—and especially in our remember-
ing—is group conversation (Manier, 1997; Manier et al., 1996).
It may be useful to illustrate these points with an example, drawn from a conversation between
family members about their recent trip to Coney Island (words contained within virgules —such
as “/example/”— indicate two or more speakers talking simultaneously; see Manier, 1997, for
more details and transcription conventions). Prompted by an interviewer to describe their trip, the
family members engaged in this exchange:
Father: What did we eat there?
Daughter: We ate hot dogs, and we ate,
Son: I never ate the, /I never ate anything, I never ate anything, I never ate anything./
Daughter: /[inaudible] corn on the cob, you know the corn on the cob/ that we ate? Yeah we did,
I remember.
Son: [shaking his head] /I never ate anything/
Father: /you ate, you ate something/ but we, we /took food from home/
Mother: /we took food from home/
Father: food from home. /And, uh/
Mother: /We took food from home,/ and
Father: No, but they ate something there, I don’t re-, I, I
Mother: Nah, they must have eaten /some ice creams and candies./
260 MANIER
11. Son: /the candy, the candy thing./ And, and we, we ate the, the su-, that uh, that fluff stuff
thing. What is it? [turning to daughter]
Daughter: Cotton candy.
Son: Yeah, /cotton candy./
Mother: /Cotton candy, yeah./
The father begins this entire exchange by prompting the others with a question, what cognitive psy-
chologists might call a cue: “What did we eat there?” At first, the son’s very clear and emphatic
memory is that he did not eat anything at Coney Island, and the daughter’s contrary assertions
(about hot dogs and corn on the cob) do not persuade him. But in the course of the conversation,
things begin to change: Finally, when the mother suggests that the children ate candy, the son re-
members that he ate “that fluff stuff thing.” Unable to recall the name of it, he turns to the daughter,
who tells him that it was cotton candy, which the mother confirms.
We witness in this example how the dynamics of the conversation shaped the unfolding, not
just of what was said, but also of what was remembered. It is quite likely that, if he had not partici-
pated in this conversation, the son would have persisted in his belief that he “never ate anything”
during the trip to Coney Island. Interviewed individually, prior to this conversation, he insisted on
this. His sister’s contrary assertions were not enough to change his opinion. But finally, following
a comment by his mother, his memory changed (cf. Manier et al., 2003). It is rather clear that what
happened was not simply the automatic result of a series of prompts and cues, like triggering the
latch on a box. Instead, the conversation was a social interaction that led to a change of mind in
one of the members (see the literature on the social contagion of memory, e.g., Gabbert, Memon,
& Allan, 2003; Meade & Roediger, 2002; Roediger, Meade, & Bergman, 2001). In this conversa-
tion, as in other conversations within this family, the mother’s input carried particular weight, es-
pecially for her son (self-report inventories administered to family members revealed tensions
between the father and son, but no such tensions between the mother and son—see the discussion
in Manier, 1997). Only by analyzing the dynamics of the conversation, as well as the family dy-
namics and the sociocultural context in which the conversation took place, can we fully under-
stand how and why the son changed his mind.
CONCLUSION
Memory research is currently in a state of transition. No longer can it be said, as Neisser (1978)
once did, that there is little research being done that illuminates problems of everyday memory. To
the contrary, in the past couple of decades much scholarly attention has been given to ecologically
valid and practical approaches to the study of memory (see Gruneberg, Morris, & Sykes, 1978,
1988; Harris & Morris, 1984; Neisser, 1982; Neisser & Winograd, 1988; Rubin, 1986, 1996). The
trend has even alarmed some advocates of controlled laboratory experimentation, and set off a mi-
nor controversy (see Banaji & Crowder, 1989, 1991; Loftus, 1991; Tulving, 1991). Nonetheless,
while much ecologically valid research is being done, controlled laboratory experiments remain
the standard in most psychology journals.
Cognitive psychology (or at least one strand of it, see Bruner, 1990) is prone to viewing mem-
ory as being in the brain. Based on this approach, cognitive psychology has indisputably made ad-
vances, for example, in understanding the neurological basis of certain cognitive functions (see
IS MEMORY IN THE BRAIN? 261
12. Gazzaniga, 1995; Gross, 1998). That such studies are valuable is indisputable, but just as surely,
they are not the only valuable approaches. Whether or not, as Banaji and Crowder (1991) com-
plained, their original article criticizing everyday memory research was misunderstood, the fact
remains that many psychologists, and many journals of psychology, still doubt the value of natu-
ralistic studies. Studies of conversational remembering continue to be viewed, by many cognitive
psychologists, as telling us something about conversation, but not about memory.
If my argument is correct, then the science of human memory, if it is not to be truncated, must
take into account not only acts of silent remembering, but also acts of conversational remember-
ing. Much can be learned by studying remembering where it naturally occurs: in the home, at
school, in the office, in the courtroom (see Amsterdam & Bruner, 2001; Bruner, 1990, 1996, 2002;
Bruner & Feldman, 1996; Cole, 1996; Eisenberg, 1985; Scribner, 1985; Shore & Bruner, 1998).
When studying such naturally occurring acts of remembering, the influence of sociocultural fac-
tors can be taken into account in a way that is less likely as long as memory is viewed as something
that takes place in the brain.
Remembering is not only shaped by internal, cognitive processes. When we reconstruct past
events in the context of conversations, the conversational roles that are adopted by group members
will affect what is remembered (see Manier, 1997). Moreover, conversational remembering can be
shaped by other influences (e.g., language conventions, see Gumperz, 1982a, 1982b; aspects of
interethnic communication, see Ross, 1978; and culturally distinctive conceptions of the self, see
Roland, 1988). These influences on remembering—as well as a host of other sociocultural fac-
tors—tend to be missed by an approach that limits itself to what goes on in the brain.
Although scholars of cultural psychology may find this perspective congenial (or even banal),
some cognitive psychologists are likely to find this to be a controversial position. Somewhat surpris-
ingly, the conflict between followers of Ebbinghaus’s conception of memory as a faculty best stud-
ied with meaningless nonsense syllables, on the one hand, and followers of Bartlett’s understanding
of remembering as an activity, on the other hand, continues still today. Perhaps there is a way to rec-
oncile these competing research programs (see Loftus, 1991). Although such reconciliation is to be
desired, the conflict may be more deep-seated than it appears—its roots may lie in fundamentally
different worldviews, reflected in ancient times in the differences between Aristotle’s emphasis on
the importance of taxonomic classification, as opposed to Plato’s emphasis on dialogic processes.
Still, many psychologists agree that memory should not be conceptualized as a storehouse of rep-
resentations squirreled away somewhere in the mind or brain (Bartlett, 1932/1995; see also Manier,
1997; Neisser, 1978, 1982). Then they may also agree that the analysis of narratives and conversa-
tions, of spoken and written acts of remembering, is not simply an exercise in anthropology or liter-
ary criticism. Perhaps they will also come to agree that advances in the scientific study of narratives
about past events can be expected to advance the understanding of the nature of memory itself.
If so, psychologists may come to acknowledge that the bewildering complexity of remember-
ing as it takes place in myriad “everyday” sociocultural contexts should not deter us from asking
the questions that need to be addressed if we are to advance our understanding of social remem-
bering. This perspective has been eloquently argued by Tamas (1998, para. 3), who noted that the
“influences of the age, the limitations imposed on us by tastes and prejudices, the customs and tra-
ditions of the place in which we happen to live ... [constitute] the essential cause of the shape our
ideas might take, and not the inadvertent impurities unavoidable in the thought of a mere human.”
The “tastes and prejudices, the customs and traditions of the place in which we happen to live” de-
fine boundaries within which we are able to think (at least as much as the capacities of our brains),
262 MANIER
13. and therefore can be viewed, in a sense, as “limitations.” But, because these limitations are potent
(even if they can be problematized, and perhaps even transcended), it is not the proper task of
scholars simply to eschew them, but rather to study them.
The study of autobiographical memory (see Rubin, 1986, 1996) will be particularly benefited
by a science of memory that encompasses acts of conversational remembering. To be sure, some
autobiographical recollections take place in the context of silent remembering. But at least as of-
ten, autobiographical remembering takes place in conversations with friends and family mem-
bers, or with a therapist, or in acts of writing (e.g., in a journal). And these acts of conversation and
writing, whether they take place in the context of family conversations or somewhere else, help to
constitute the identity of individuals (see Bruner, 1990; Bruner & Feldman, 1996; Freeman, 1993;
Schafer, 1992). To remember the personal past (see Ross, 1991), it helps to talk with people who
shared the experience of past events with us. Talking about shared past experiences with family
members, for example, is an important cultural tool that assists us in remembering the personal
past, thereby constructing deeper and more complete notions of our own selfhood and identity (cf.
Dennett, 1998; Wertsch, 1998). This kind of family remembering (see Manier, 1997) is an exam-
ple of a social behavior that deserves, as much as anything in the brain, to be called memory. To
the extent that this is true, the study of acts of conversational remembering of autobiographical
events holds the promise, not only of advancing the science of memory, but also of helping to illu-
minate fundamental questions of selfhood and identity.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The author acknowledges the support of grants from the PSC-CUNY program at Lehman College,
City University of New York, as well as the MRISP and MBRS programs of the United States Na-
tional Institutes of Health (NIH). In addition to research performed at Lehman College, this article
is based in part on research conducted while the author was completing doctoral studies in the De-
partment of Psychology at New School University.
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![specific set of topics—including cognitive dissonance, attribution errors, and minority influ-
ence—whereas cognitive psychology is defined in terms of a different set of topics—including
language, attention, and memory. Based on such definitions, the topic of social remembering may
seem a hybrid thing, infelicitous and possibly sterile, uniting in a rather problematic way disparate
elements of social psychology and cognitive psychology (see Moscovici, 1983, for a different ap-
proach to defining social psychology).
To many cognitive psychologists, conceiving of remembering as social behavior, and of the
science of memory as encompassing communicative acts, may seem impertinent. Cognitive psy-
chology has a characteristic way of viewing questions related to memory, which is (in brief) to
study memory as a psychological function that is best analyzed in the laboratory, where extrane-
ous variables can be controlled, rather than in the natural settings where social interactions nor-
mally take place. Many experimental psychologists have made this argument, for example, Banaji
and Crowder (1989, p. 1192), who argued, “the more complex a phenomenon, the greater the need
to study it under controlled conditions, and the less it ought to be studied in its natural complex-
ity.” Viewed from the perspective of these psychologists, the science of memory has more in com-
mon with neurology than with anthropology. Yet, in the discussion that follows, I will argue for
the usefulness of conceptualizing remembering as social behavior, and for expanding the science
of memory to include communicative acts.
Over the past several years, my colleagues and I have been conducting studies of conversa-
tional remembering (Manier, 1997; see also Hirst & Manier, 1996, 2002; Hirst, Manier, &
Apetroaia, 1997; Manier, Pinner, & Hirst, 1996). These studies demonstrate that, in naturalistic
contexts, when groups such as families engage in conversations about the past, they tend to orga-
nize their interactions in such a way that particular group members take special responsibility for
narrating, that is, telling the story about the past event. In other words, group members adopt con-
versational roles, either as narrators or as nonnarrators. Who takes what role has consequences for
what is said in the group recounting, especially in relation to the unique recollections of particular
individuals, with narrators introducing more of their unique recollections into the group recount-
ing than nonnarrators. Most recently, our research group has found evidence that even one single
group conversation of this sort can have measurable effects on the subsequent recollections of in-
dividual group members, leading their individual recollections toward conformity with that of the
narrator in the group (Manier, Hirst, & Cuc, 2003).
The research that my colleagues and I have been undertaking certainly tells us something about
conversations, but does it tell us something about memory? My argument is that it does, but it is
not clear that this point would be conceded by all. For example, Tulving (2002, p. 20) recently an-
nounced that memory
has a home, even if still a hidden one, in the brain. … An event happens, a person experiences it, mem-
ory traces are laid down representing the event, the past vanishes and is replaced by the present. The
memory traces of the event continue to exist in the present, they are retrieved, and the person remem-
bers the event. This, in a nutshell, … [is] how memory works.
Tulving, who is a preeminent authority on the psychology of memory, clearly locates memory in
the brain. But does this description of memory leave room for the kinds of social processes that my
colleagues and I have studied under the rubric of conversational remembering? Does it even leave
room for the kind of research undertaken decades ago by Bartlett (1932/1995)? Perhaps it does (see
252 MANIER](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)