Displaced Pasts. Memories of Migrations

Since the 1970s, initiatives have emerged in many countries to promote the memories of migration. All of them aim to achieve recognition and full acceptance of migrants (immigrants and emigrants) and their descendants by local populations. This issue analyzes upstream the reasons and the conditions of this interest as well as the characteristics of the initiators but especially downstream the paradoxical effects of theses actions. It wonders about the interest of those concerned, migrants and descendants, in these initiatives, as well as about the gap between the memories transmitted in the private space and the public uses of the past. Finally, it questions the belief in the benefits of public narratives and patrimonialization of migratory past and their capacity to act on the representations of migrations.