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Who Owns Memory? Democratic Participation in Digital Public History
The project explores how societies remember, interpret, contest, and communicate
difficult histories in the digital age.
The project asks whose stories become part of public history, which experiences remain overlooked,
and who has the power to preserve, interpret, and share the past. It also examines
how digital media shape collective memory, historical understanding, and public debate.
Bringing together students, researchers, educators, cultural professionals, and members of the public,
the project creates a collaborative space for critical reflection, exchange, and practical work.
Through workshops, oral testimony, archival research, digital mapping, and storytelling,
participants investigate historical narratives, identify absent or marginalised voices,
and transform research into accessible digital public-history content.
The project is funded by the Foundation Remembrance, Responsibility and Future (EVZ Foundation).
Our Vision
Our Vision
History is never simply about the past.
Every society decides which events are remembered, whose voices are heard, and which stories remain absent from public memory. Museums, archives, schools, monuments, media, and digital platforms all influence how we understand the past and how historical narratives are passed from one generation to the next.
Who Owns Memory? encourages participants to think critically about these processes while exploring how public history can promote dialogue, inclusion, and democratic participation.
What We Do
What We Do
Participants explore history through collaboration.
Working with oral testimonies, archival documents, photographs, maps, and local historical narratives, they investigate how personal memories become part of collective history and how historical knowledge is created, interpreted, and communicated.
Behind the Project
Behind the Project
Scientific Coordinator and Project Lead
Scientific Coordinator and Project Lead
Dr Marina Bantiou is the Scientific Coordinator and Project Lead of Who Owns Memory? Democratic Participation in Digital Public History.
She is a historian based in Greece and currently serves as a Visiting Researcher at the Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History (C²DH), as well as a Postdoctoral Researcher at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.
Funding
Funding
Who Owns Memory? is funded by the Foundation Remembrance, Responsibility and Future—in German, Stiftung Erinnerung, Verantwortung und Zukunft (EVZ Foundation)—as part of the Histoday 2026: “No Time to Forget. For Democracy, Facts and Dignity.” programme.
The EVZ Foundation, based in Berlin, promotes a culture of remembrance that inspires curiosity, connects historical knowledge with the present, and encourages critical discussion. Through its work, the Foundation supports projects that strengthen democratic values, historical responsibility, dignity, and active engagement with difficult histories.
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