Bu makalede, Batı düşünce geleneğinin "hatırlama" kavramından hareketle geliştirdiği üç farklı bellek türü üzerine genel bir tartışma yapılacaktır. Bu tartışmanın ilk amacı, "hatırlama" kavramına bağlı olarak geliştirilen bu üç tür bellek anlayışından ilk ikisinin, sadece bireysel ya da toplumsal olana odaklanarak, kültürel olan belleği ihmal etmelerine dikkat çekmektir. Bireysel bellek kuramı, bireyin belleğine içkin anılardan hareketle bir hatırlama kavramı geliştirirken; buna karşı çıkan kolektif bellek kuramı ise, bir grup ya da topluluk içinde oluşan anıların, yine o kolektif yapı içinde olunduğunda hatırlanacağını ileri sürecektir. Kısaca bu iki rakip kuram, belleğin içerikleri olan anıların "bireysel" ya da "kolektif" olduğunu savunur. İkinci dikkat çekilecek konu da, bu iki kuramın hatırlama anlayışına dayanan "bellek" zorluğudur. Çünkü hatırlayanı temsil eden bireysellik ve kolektiflik, gelenek kadar uzun ömürlü değildir. Bu nedenle, bu iki kuramın önerdiği belleğin ömrü birey ya da grup kadardır. Oysa bir gelenek söz konusu olduğunda kimin hatırladığından çok neyin hatırlandığı önem kazanır. Böylece hatırlanan şeyin ne olduğu, geleneğin içeriğinin de ne olduğunu belirler. Hatırlanan şeyin ne olduğuna yönelecek bir hatırlama anlayışı da "kültürel bellek" kavramıyla karşılanabilecektir. Bu durumda bellek, hem geçmişi intikal ettirerek gelenek haline gelmesini sağlayacak hem de belleğin "kültürel" olarak inşa edilmesini sağlayacaktır. Geleneğin, geçmişten farklı olarak bir kültürel bellekle ilgili bir kavram olması, geçmişin intikal ettirilerek geleneğe dönüşmesi anlamına gelecektir. Sonuç olarak bu makalede, bellekle ilgili ileri sürülen savlardan hareketle geleneğin, belleğin "kültürel" olarak yeniden inşa edilerek farklı bir "hatırlama" anlayışla sürdürebileceği üzerine bir tartışma yapmaktır

In this article, starting from the concept of the 'western' tought tradition, a general discussion will be made about the three different memory types it developed. The first aim of this discussion is to draw attention, that the first two of the three memory understandings which were developed based on the "rememberance" concept, only concentrate on the individual or social, and neglect the cultural memory. While the individual memory theory, developes a rememberance concept in the memory of the individual starting from immanent memories; the collective memory theory alleges, that memories created in a group or community will be recalled again when one is again in the same collective structure. In short these two rival theories, argue that the content of the memory the memories are either "individual" or "collective". The other subject which should be pointed out is the difficulty to associate the "memory" concept of these two theories, which is based on the "rememberance" understandin, with the concept of "tradition". Because the individuality and collectivity which represent the one who remembers, are not long living as tradition. Because of this, the life of the memory that these two theories recommend, is as long as the individual or the group. Whereas a tradition comes into question it's more important what is remembered than who remembers. So what the remembered thing is, defines what the content of the tradition is. An understanding of rememberance that will tend to what the remembered thing is can be met with the term "cultural memory". In this situation the memory becomes a tradition by relapsing the past and enables the memory to be build as "cultural". Different from the past, tradition is a concept related to the cultural memory and will mean that it transforms into tradition by repeating the past. As a result this article will argue that, from the alleged memory related arguments, tradition can continue it's existence in a different understanding of "rememberance" by the "cultural" reconstruction of the memory. The terms remembrance, memory and tradition which are discussed in the light of the two fundamental theories that consider the memory as individual and social, were first discussed in the framework of the time understanding of the past. It was revealed that the individual memory theory acted on the time understanding of experiences being perceived individually or personally, whereas the social memory acts on the experiences being perceived collectively. It is remarked that the first one defends a time understanding that can be measured with perception notion acting on an individual’s inner or outer senses; the second defends a time understanding of experiences created by the collective conscience of the group members. Therefore the individual memory is described as the sum of memories lived in the past based on the individual perception. On the other side the social memory, describes memory as the memories of former collective experiences based on the time understanding lived together. These two memory types are different when it comes to “remembrance”, they are even rivals. One of the rival memory theories describes the individuality relying on the individual understanding of time, as a “memory” immanent to the subject. The memories immanent to the “I” belong to the individuals own past. So remembrance is individual because the memory is individual. As for the social memory theory accepts time as a social or collective time concept and regards memory as the past lived together in a community or group. In this regard according to this theory memory is social because the memories are collective. Therefore the remembrance happens being in a collective. Halbwachs, who put the “collective time” concept up against the time understanding of the individual memory theory, retrieved the time concept of the individual perception and stood against the abstraction of space. His collective time proposal connected the “past” thought to collectivity of the memory that was build on the “remember together” thought. So he is the first resistance with his “social memory” against the “individual memory” which has a strong past in Western history. This resistance can be regarded as the breaking off of the history of the individuality that is trapped in the “subject” concept which is tried to be build for years only as an “information” oriented “past” thought. But Halbwachs’ resistance was insufficient and couldn’t flee the memories’ tradition the modernity. His “remembrance” left to the reliability of the witnesses joining a group, couldn’t solve the problem of transferring the past to the later generations exceeding the lifetime of the group. Of course members of groups that went through genocide or a revolution will recall the memories lived “together” again together. But the social memory that makes this remembrance possible will be insufficient in situations where the importance surpasses the generation togetherness founded by the members, e.g. genocide, assimilation, revolution or other epochal incidents. Writers like Assmann and Connerton are aware of that situation and went on search for a different memory type. Despite the fact that both look from a different angle their common point is the determination that memory can’t depend only on the individual or the collective. This determination leads them to the cultural memory thought even if they went through different roads. Another writer who realized that the collective side of the memory was ignored and the individual side was concentrated on is Ricouer, he draw attention to the problems of the memory understandings based on traditional western reminisces and images during the linking of memory with history. According to him thoughts about memory were “I” oriented and relied on the question “who?” the remembering is. That is to say, that for a long time the western memory thought gave priority to the “who” question. That is why, the question “what has reminiscence?” is asked before the question “whom belongs the memory?” and tells that the social memory is to be considered as well. This determination of Ricoeur, underlines what the remembering is than who the remembering is. And on one point this is a path leading to the cultural memory.