Forgetting, Remembering, and Higher Education’s Role in Memory Work

In this paper, I primarily attend to practices of forgetting, particularly in relation to institutions of higher education. I do so, first, to make sense of the current theo-political context and second, to raise two considerations for reflection if colleges and universities seek to continue in their role as keepers and sustainers of collective memory. Although colleges and universities often emphasize their role in the preservation of memory, I start by sketching a legacy of forgetting to better understand present realities. I then explore a couple of Presidential Executive Orders which witness troubling enactments of remembering and forgetting. Finally, I turn to James Crockford’s 2022 article, “Contested Memorials and the Discipleship of Christian Memory,” to think through the role of higher education in relation to memory, attentive to current challenges and perennial moral obligations.