A crucial challenge which countries and/or communities coming out of violent conflict have to address is how to remember the violent past. The memories of what happened in the past and how the past is being explained may have serious implications for the long-term process of reconciliation and peacebuilding in post-conflict countries (Cairns and Roe, 2003). While conflict parties or groups in power may attempt to impose their version of the past as the official narrative or history, thereby “silencing and denying the versions of their political adversaries or subordinate groups” (Impunity Watch, 2012), it is important to stress here that common people may think about and remember their country’s violent past very differently. The objective of this paper is to analyse how people in Goma in the Democratic Republic of Congo are remembering and explaining the repeated conflicts and violence which has ravaged their region in recent times.
More specifically, we aim to answer the following three research questions: (1) How do people remember and explain the violent past in the Goma region? 2) To what extent are there competing conflict narratives and histories being maintained among the population in Goma? and 3) how are these conflict narratives and memories affecting people’s social interactions and social practices?
In order answer these questions, an extensive period of ethnographic research has been conducted in Goma.
Research in Goma shows the memories and narratives of the population remain strongly marked by the weight of the violent past conflict. While official memory attempts to silence the violent history of the region, there are multitudes of memories and narratives of the past made up of an intermingling of individual and collective memories, family narratives, often transmitted orally within families, neighborhoods, ...
Far from being homogeneous, these memories and narrative vary according to social, ethnic groups. The past has increased the feeling of victimization within groups and affects the social relations and everyday life of the population .