7.14. Capitalism and the Work of Memory: From Institutions to Everyday Worlds

Using the case of Yardenit, a Christian baptism site on the Jordan River, I will explore the understudied nexus between economy and collective memory. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork (2013–2017), interviews, archival materials, and site observations, I trace four historical phases in Yardenit’s evolution. From its establishment in the early 1980s' –effected by geopolitics -- through periods of exclusivity, expansion, and competition— I show how the pursuit of profit not only shaped the sacred meanings attached to the site but also redefined the collective memory of Jesus’ baptism, transforming an invented location into a globally recognized place of devotion. Yet, while the economy drives commemoration, religious conventions and notions of sacredness simultaneously constrain economic exploitation. Yardenit thus exemplifies the dialectical relationship between economy and collective memory, where the commodification of the sacred both sustains and limits the making of the past.

This paper presents the first results of a new research project linking the concept of ‘non-places’ to identity generation and memory making in unexpected locations, among them airports. In a challenge to Marc Augé’s (1995) designation of places of transit as spaces without meaning to the individual (“it exists, and it does not contain any organic society”), I examine how airports of all kinds – from the smallest grass landing strips to mega airports like Paris Charles de Gaulle or Singapore Changi – are indeed a space for negotiating a sense of belonging and community. The approach to this work includes multi-sited ethnographies of the Mainz-Finthen airfield, the low cost Hahn Airport, the Frankfurt-Egelsbach business airport and, finally, Frankfurt Airport, Germany’s busiest. Having grown up around airport communities, too, this project entails a degree of autoethnography that other studies of transport infrastructure generally lack. Research methods include semi-structured interviews of workers, business operators, passengers and administrators at each site, participant observation during key events from 2025 to 2028 (including the opening of Frankfurt Airport’s Terminal 3, Europe’s largest construction project, on 22 April 2026) and archival research in regional archives across the German states of Rhineland-Palatinate and Hesse. This is particularly relevant in unearthing the legacy of the US military presence through the early 1990s with the first wave of airport privatization. The ambition of this paper and, more generally, of this project is to lay out a cultural and memory studies approach to understanding ‘non-places’ and how they inform individual and group identities across class and generational lines. To address this question requires the incorporation of a transcultural memory approach (Erll 2011) to examine economic structures that underpin life in and around the airport.

The presentation provides an overview of my doctoral research, focusing on the role of funding in shaping memory institutions in Latin America. It examines how financial support from international actors, particularly the Ford Foundation, influenced the development and sustainability of institutions dedicated to preserving the memories of civil-military dictatorships in Argentina, with a focus on the cases of Centro de Estudios Legales y Sociales and Memoria Abierta. The presentation analyzes the emergence of the field of memory entrepreneurship, highlighting how Argentine institutions strategically engaged with foreign donors to secure both resources and legitimacy. By doing this, the study emphasizes the often-overlooked infrastructural and administrative dimensions of memory, showing how interactions with funders shape the possibilities and constraints of memory work. From a transnational perspective, it traces the networks, technical tools, and strategies that enable memory institutions to become viable and influential. The presentation draws primarily on fieldwork conducted in Buenos Aires, São Paulo, Santiago, and New York (Rockefeller Archive Center), as well as on interviews with individuals involved in the creation of memory institutions and with funding agents, particularly staff members of the Ford Foundation.

Global statistics indicate a persistent gender gap in labor force participation—with women at just over 50 percent compared to men at 80 percent (World Bank, 2022). Himachal Pradesh, the central region of India’s north western Himalayas, paints a slightly different picture, reporting a female participation rate of 58.4 percent. The state is often highlighted as a model of social inclusion, as noted in the 2015 study conducted by the World Bank Group titled ‘Scaling the Heights: Social Inclusion and Sustainable Development in Himachal Pradesh.’ The report also emphasizes improved access to markets and services for historically marginalized groups including Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, and women. To understand the deeper dynamics of development, it becomes essential to examine the occupational distribution of women within this region. This study focuses on two major tribal communities—the Gaddis and the Gujjars—who make up nearly 70 percent of Himachal Pradesh’s tribal population (Census 2011). In Himachal Pradesh, the Gujjar community is comprised of two distinct subgroups: the nomadic Van Gujjars, who migrate with their livestock, and the Settled Gujjars, who maintain permanent village-based livelihoods. How do tribal women in Himachal Pradesh participate in the labor force, and how do occupational structures intersect with collective memory and traditional livelihood practices? Using a qualitative and comparative methodology, the study draws on ethnographic accounts and cultural memory frameworks to map women’s work across pastoral, semi nomadic, and settled contexts. Findings reveal that women’s economic roles are shaped not only by ecology and mobility but also by inherited collective memories of pastoral labor, intergenerational knowledge, and gendered traditions of work. The study concludes that tribal women’s labor is dynamic and embedded in collective memory, underscoring the need for policy approaches that recognize these gendered and culturally rooted occupational structures.

The debate on collective memory usually centers around narratives produced by the state or political actors. However, the current unprecedented accumulation of capital made wealthy people and private companies ever powerful shapers of collectively accepted narratives about society. In this paper I will show how typical success stories of a person becoming rich follow the canons of a heroic narrative (Campbell, 2003) and make up a mythology that is at the core of the capitalist imaginary. I will root my argument in an anthropological analysis of a set of accounts from conferences and courses for young entrepreneurs in Buenos Aires, Argentina, both online and offline, registered between 2023 and 2025. The presentation seeks to contribute to the debate on the new spirit of capitalism (Boltanski and Chiapello, 2005) and the specific set of values (Graeber, 2002) that it needs to install in our social imaginary (Taylor, 2003) in order to continue appearing legitimate.