TITLE:
On the Face and Construction of Memory Ethics: Social Memory and Individual Memory
AUTHORS:
Mengyao Yan, Xinghua Hao
KEYWORDS:
Memory Obligation, Social Memory, Individual Memory, Ethical Constructs
JOURNAL NAME:
Advances in Applied Sociology,
Vol.15 No.10,
October
29,
2025
ABSTRACT: Memory has been a hot research topic in a variety of contemporary disciplinary fields, and it is also an important issue that cannot be ignored in the study of ethics. How should we memorize historical events? This cannot be separated from the ethics of memory in ethics, which covers both social memory and individual memory. Social memory seeks to reflect the overall appearance of social events, adopts grand narratives, records the times, and highlights the function of social integration in order to construct the basic consensus of society; individual memory highlights the individual’s life situation, emotional experience, and value demands, and seeks to make social history present the “face of humanity”, enrich the details of history, and feel the real existence of life and humanity. The individual memory emphasizes the individual’s life situation, emotional experience and value appeal. Through the interaction and co-construction of social memory and individual memory, we can draw a picture of history, reflecting the contemporary demands and practical significance of the ethics of memory.