Computing and the 1930s Cinema Culture Project

Annette Kuhn

As the second in a series of blog posts showcasing Cinema Memory Archive assets relating to project planning, conduct and outreach, we now present a discussion paper exploring the potential role of computing in Cinema Culture in 1930s Britain (CCINTB). The document reproduced below was drafted in April 1995, during the project’s early months when pilot interviews were being conducted in Glasgow. The team was looking ahead to the analysis of interviews and other participant-generated data, a process that would call for a qualitative or interpretive, rather than a quantitative, approach. The aim was to determine whether and how this objective could be met with the help of computing.

Although computer-assisted quantitative data analysis had been in use in the Social Sciences for decades, computer-assisted qualitative analysis was relatively new and, certainly as far as I was aware, unknown in the Humanities. “Computing and the 1930s Cinema Culture Project”(1)  traces the thinking and some of the preparation behind CCINTB’s eventual venture into computer-assisted qualitative data analysis.

 

Computing and the 1930s Cinema Culture Project

1. Introduction

The stated objectives of the project are: “To gather data, in various forms, on cinemagoing and other popular leisure pursuits of the 1930s – habits, tastes, preferences – across Britain, and to document regional, gender and class variations in these” and “To devise and put into effect a set of ‘ethnohistorical’ methodologies appropriate to the collection, analysis and interpretation of oral history and archival source materials”.(2)

These objectives were formulated initially with outputs in mind: it was considered that interview and other data collected during the course of the project might eventually be made available to other researchers as, say, an interactive CD-ROM.  For this, the material would need at least to be indexed in some way and/or some analysis of the material included alongside the raw data.  The proposal was made in ignorance of what would be involved.  At the same time, while I did not formulate the issue in these terms, I realised there would also be a need for data management of some sort, so that researchers would be able to extract bits of information from large volumes of interview and other data, a task for which an interpretive rather than a quantitative approach would be required.

Even this overstates the degree to which the computer usage/application side of the project had been thought out in advance, however: although one of the people interviewed for the Research Fellowship mentioned NUD-IST (see below) and another was a user of Hypersoft, I had little sense of what these programs could do, beyond the fact that they had been developed specifically for working with interview data. My formulation of things at this stage was that we needed to find, adapt or develop databases for archival and oral history material. When it became apparent early on in the project that approaches to computer specialists were not proving very fruitful (Glasgow University’s Computer Advisory Service could only suggest Filemaker), I realised I did not know enough even to ask the right questions.

The first real breakthrough came as I was browsing in the Sociology section of Dillons in Malet Street, where there is a whole bay devoted to social science research methods.  I picked up a copy of Miles and Huberman (1994), and saw that it included an Appendix on choosing computer programs for qualitative data analysis. This includes a table (p.316) setting out the characteristics of 22 programs available or developed for the analysis of qualitative data: a couple of these (NUD-IST and The Ethnograph) I had heard of already: Hypersoft was not included in the table. I sent off for demos of those which seemed most appropriate, and pursued inquiries about Hypersoft. The NUD-IST demo arrived first, and raised a new  problem: that of getting software running in the first place if you are not very computer literate and have no-one to turn to for advice. Luckily, the documentation accompanying the NUD-IST demo included information on potential sources of advice, including two discussion groups devoted to computer assisted qualitative data analysis (henceforth CAQDAS), one of them run by the Melbourne-based developers of NUD-IST and the other much closer to home, by the Sociology Department of the University of Surrey.

With inquiries among the computing community at Glasgow University continuing to prove fruitless, this was the exactly what I needed.  Simply listening in to these discussion groups proved most informative:  I began to get a sense of which of the programs were most in use (at least by this group of people) and for what purposes and in which disciplines.  Discusssion group subscribers seem to come mainly from Social Psychology and Geography departments, and there is an interest in areas such as discourse analysis among discussants.  A discussion I initiated on CAQDAS and oral history interview material produced some interesting, if not entirely pertinent, ideas and generated useful contacts (NUD-IST users in Glasgow and Stirling, for example) and an invitation to a Geographers’ Conference.  This was very encouraging and made me feel a bit less useless! Interestingly, those who replied to my query were Ethnograph users.

Information about courses and workshops on CAQDAS is also posted through these discussion groups, and it was through one of them that I learned about a short course at the University of Surrey which I attended from 23 to 25 March.  This dealt not only with the nuts and bolts of several QDA software packages, but more importantly opened up key questions which I had not even been able fully to formulate before.  This, plus the local contacts I have made among CAQDAS users (the latter through personal networks as well as discussion groups), are the most promising developments so far.  What follows is what I have learned from these sources, from my reading, and above all from the extremely timely and useful CAQDAS course.

  1. QDA Software and its Uses

There are various uses and applications of computer software in qualitative research.

* Tasks such as making notes in the field, writing up or transcribing field notes, editing of notes and preparing interim and final reports can be performed with word processing software.

* Data management tasks such as coding and storage in an organised database, data search and retrieval, data ‘linking’ (connecting relevant data segments to each other; forming categories, clusters or networks of information), memoing, content analysis, data display  and conclusion-drawing and verification are where the packages developed specifically for qualitative data analysis come into their own, though not all of the packages available can do all of these things well, or at all, and all do what they do in rather different ways.

* More advanced tasks such as theory-building and graphic mapping (creating diagrams that depict findings or theories) are offered by several software packages.

Before deciding on whether and which computer applications will be useful, the researcher must first decide which of these tasks are paramount for the project.  Weitzman and Miles (1994) provide a useful categoristaion of types of software which can be used in qualitative research:

Text retrievers and text-based managers (of which there are many, e g Metamorph, Sonar Professional, The Text Collector, WordCruncher, ZyINDEX, Folio VIEWS, Tabletop, MAX).  These were not developed specifically for QDA but for organising huge text bases that require limited but fast analytic features. Data is recoverable by keywords already in text, and some packages offer additional features such as word counts, concordances, KWIC). Textbase managers offer more organising and sorting features than text retrievers.

Code-and-retrieve packages (e g HyperQual, Kwalitan, QUALPRO, The Ethnograph) are really where QDA begins, and have in fact been developed by qualitative researchers rather than computer programmers.  They can divide text into segments and find and display chunks with a given code or combination of codes.  Some programs can also retrieve data on a subject where a given keyword does not appear, and support memoing.  The fact tht these are not commercial packages means that while they have been developed with the qualitative researcher’s needs in mind, there may be difficulties with infrastructure, documentation and technical support.

Code-based theory builders (e g AQUAD, ATLAS/ti, HyperRESEARCH, NUD-IST) can do everything the most advanced code-and-retrievers do  but also offer conceptualistion and systematic analysis e g through exploring connections between codes.  Some of them offer graphical displays of codes and their relationships; and some can test hypotheses, handle offline data such as unformatted text, videos, etc.

Conceptual network builders (eg SemNet, Inspiration) permit organisation of ideas in the form of a network of topics linked by named relations.  While none support coding, some offer limited search and retrieval.  The strength of these packages lies in their support of data ‘linking’.  These packages were developed for brainstorming, development of ideas and concepts and mindmapping rather than for QDA.

Before deciding whether to use CAQDAS, or which type of software to choose, the researcher should be clear about the tasks with which software could assist, and then ask:

* How computerate am I?

* Is there a preferred platform (e g Mac,  Windows, DOS)

* What is the project timetable?

* Am I working alone or in a team?

* For what audience is the analysis intended?

* What analytic commitments and orientation do I have?

* Am I choosing for one project or for the next few years?

* What kinds of projects and databases will i be involved with?

* What kinds of analysis am I likely to do?

Other important considerations include nature of data sources (single or multiple); whether records are fixed or will be revised; how structured or open the data is; whether data entries are uniform or diverse; size of the data base; whether analysis is exploratory or confirmatory; whether coding schemes should be firm at the outset or can evolve as the project proceeds; whether multiple or single coding of data segments is required; whether coding is to be iterative or single pass; how important the context of coded data is; how one wishes to have data displayed; whether analysis is purely qualitative or includes numbers as well.

In other words, fitness for purpose is the key. There is no point in choosing the latest software that does everything imaginable if the researcher needs assistance only with basic tasks, nor in choosing complex software that comes with little technical support if she is not highly computerate or if there is a limited timescale to the project, nor in choosing software that supports only DOS when confined to Mac platform.

Within functions, different packages offer varying approaches and degrees of help.  For example, for code and retrieve, some offer multiple coding for any segment of data, others do not; some handle overlapping codes, others do not; some allow the researcher to rename and reorganise codes as the project progresses, others do not; some are faster than others; some offer searches for strings of characters, synonyms or wild cards, others do not.  Packages differ in the way the results of searches are displayed, and whether records of searches are kept.

There is therefore no single answer to the question: what is the best QDA package?  It depends on the project –its objectives, its circumstances, the people working on it.

  1. QDA Software and Cinema Culture in 1930s Britain

First of all, given that it figures in the project’s objectives, we are committed to some sort of computer application. CAQDAS would answer our need to store, manage and analyse the kind of data we are collecting (this is not only interviews but also such material as field notes, letters and other writings from respondents, etc).  It is not clear at this stage whether CAQDAS will also lend itself to the objective of making data available to outsiders in electronic form.  I don’t see why it should not, but have to admit to total ignorance on this point.  It may be that we will end up making this a separate project if particular sorts of computer expertise are required for it.

As far as CAQDAS is concerned, however, we will certainly need at least to be able to code and retrieve data and write memos.  It would be  helpful if offline material could be incorporated in analysis, but this is not crucial  in the short term.  Whatever software is chosen certainly needs to be user-friendly, though I am not sure if it needs to be capable of being learned quickly.  It should probably support Mac–which would limit choice considerably, since few packages are available in Mac versions. I do not feel that the project necessarily requires computer-assisted theory-building, though would not object to buying such a package in case of future need, so long as our basic requirements are met by it.

If these considerations limit the range of choice to selection from the code-and-retrievers and theory-based code builders,  it is still not easy to make a final selection in the abstract. To aid the decision-making process and offer some idea of how different packages work in practice, the CAQDAS course included demonstrations of The Ethnograph, HyperRESEARCH and NUD-IST, and hand-on tutorials with The Ethnograph and NUD-IST.

From these, and even though I had difficulties with the tutorial because of networking problems, I found I liked The Ethnograph more than I had expected. The earliest QDA software to be developed, it is quite widely used and seems (in my possibly inaccurate observation) to be favoured by researchers who like to work closely with their data–anthropologists, for example.  In this it perhaps significant that it was Ethnograph users who took part in the bulletin board discussion on CAQDAS and oral history.  It is not as expensive as most of the other packages, but is more limited than some in terms of technical backup.  On the other hand, there is obviously a large community of users out there with experience which could be drawn on.  Being a DOS package, it fits with my own preference for this platform; but of course by the same token possibly rules itself out for this project.

HyperResearch, though available in Mac version, offers no memoing facility and is therefore ruled out for this project.

NUD-IST is a popular and user-friendly package, and is highly recommended by users I have spoken to. It is the most commercial of all the QDA software, and its developers offer plenty of support, even to the extent of running a discussion group through which users can raise problems  and get quick advice from the developers, Tom and Lyn Richards. The Richardses are also very active in promoting the software through workshops, and regularly travel to Europe to run classes in NUD-IST. I found the tutorial easy to follow, although I was less comfortable with its style than I was with The Ethnograph’s. The demonstration of the package suggested to me that it was developed for researchers more interested in the codes and categories emerging from their data than in the data itself; an observation perhaps confirmed by the fact that NUD-IST users I have spoken to are predominantly working on sociological or interview-based social survey sorts of projects.  NUD-IST does of course offer code-and-retrieve, as well as quite sophisticated memoing, and is available in Mac.  An excellent feature as far as the 1930s project is concerned is its capacity to permit ongoing revision and reworking of codes throughout the life of the project, as data builds up and begins to yield different patterns. I was less impressed by the fact that NUD-IST seems to force the researcher to order codes in a hierarchical ‘tree’ and display them accordingly.  This is certainly not how I look at the relationships between categories when I interpret data of various kinds, and I would feel very hamstrung by that approach. The CAQDAS course included an exercise in (manual) coding of data which confirmed this feeling:  I–and indeed my fellow-students–discovered that we conceptualised relations between codes as matrices or networks rather than as hierarchies.  This, I have subsequently discovered, describes the ‘semantic network’ approach taken in conceptual network building software like SemNet and Inspiration.  I am not sure whether NUD-IST’s hierarchical approach to theory building can be sidestepped if one is not using the package for theory-building purposes but simply restricting oneself to code-and-retrieve, memoing, etc.

There is a package that appears to offer everything NUD-IST does as a theory builder, while supporting more of  semantic network approach to conceptualisation and theory building. ATLAS/ti was unfortunately not demonstrated uring the CAQDAS course, because the current DOS version is about to be updated and made available also in Windows. I liked the idea of this package, but have no idea how user-friendly it is. It probably rules itself out for this project, however, by being unavailable in Mac version.

  1. Conclusions, Questions and Recommendations

A number of questions emerge concerning the 1930s Cinema Culture project and computing: do we need it; and if so, what for and when?

Given the project’s objectives, it is clear that computing and computer applications are integral. It is clear to me that we should seriously consider computer assistance in data management: a project such as this, which will generate large amounts of qualitative data, needs to manage that data–store it and organise it so that the information we require will be at least readily retrievable. Before microcomputers, the techniques of the qualitative researcher involved a great deal of cutting up of transcripts, manual coding, and slotting of pieces of paper into hanging files. Researchers could soon become overwhelmed with paper, and data analysis could at best be one-dimensional–unless one wanted to be drowned in paper, any data segment would rarely be coded more than once, for instance.  Once coding was done, it would also be difficult to regain a sense of the wholeness of particular cases or interviews.  CAQDAS can assist with data analysis, permitting greater refinement and flexibility; though it does not necessarily save time.  Coding will always be timeconsuming, and the researcher using CAQDAS tends to code more deeply and elaborately than is normally possible with manual coding.  Software that supports theory-based code building offers additional functions which we can use if we wish to, but do not have to.

It seems clear, then, that the project could benefit from CAQDAS. At what point, though?  CAQDAS allows–some would say forces–the researcher to abandon the temporal separation of data collection and data analysis:  it is unnecessary to wait till all the data is in before work on it can proceed, especially if one intends to revise and develop interpretations as data unfolds.  We could begin CAQDAS, therefore, as soon as we like.  On the other hand, there is no pressing reason to rush into it.  We should perhaps discuss a suitable timescale in light of the overall progress of the project to date, therefore.

At the same time, it seems to me for various reasons that we could wait a little before making any final decisions as to which software to go for.  The choice appears to reduce to ATLAS/ti, The Ethnograph and NUD-IST. There are a number of factors pushing us towards the latter, which unfortunately is probably not the best as far as this project’s needs are concerned.  Neither of the others is available in Mac version, though Windows versions of both are apparently about to be released, so it is possible we could accommodate them by upgrading the project’s 630 to Power PC.  There are reasons why this might not be a good idea, however. It is a pity that choice should be limited for such a silly reason, and confirms my existing feelings about Mac (but that’s another story).  My conclusion is that if we decide to get into CAQDAS soon, we have little choice but to go with NUD-IST.

  1. CAQAS: Select Bibliography

Fielding, N. and R. M. Lee (1991, 2nd ed 1993). Using Computers in Qualitative Research. London: Sage Publications.

Miles, M. and A. M. Huberman (1994) Qualitative Data Analysis. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Reid, A. O. (1992) ‘Computer management strategies for text data’, in B. F. Crabtree and W. L. Miller (eds), Doing Qualitative Research. Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 125-45.

Richards, L and T. Richards (1994) ‘From filing cabinet to computer’. in A. Bryman and R. G. Burgess (eds),  Analyzing Qualitative Data. London: Routledge, 146-72.

Richards, T. and L. Richards (1994) ‘Using computers in qualitative research’, in N. K. Denzin and Y. S. Lincoln (eds),  Handbook of Qualitative Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 445-62.

Weitzman, E and M. Miles (1994). Computer Programs for Qualitative Data Analysis. Thousand Oaks, Ca: Sage Publications.

(1) Discussion Paper ‘Computing and the 1930s Cinema Culture Project’. April 1995. CC-19-000PI019. Cinema Memory Archive, Lancaster University Library Special Collections.

(2) CCINTB Application Form for the ESRC Grant Scheme. 27 October 1993. CC-19-000PR001. Cinema Memory Archive, Lancaster University Library Special Collections.

These CMA assets can be accessed via links on the CMDA website or consulted in both physical and digital form in the Cinema Memory Archive at Lancaster University, by appointment with Special Collections and Archives. 

If you wish to cite and/or re-use any CMA materials, please consult  the CMDA website for information on copyright and using the materials from the collection and for a citation referencing guide.

Cinema, childhood, memory

Annette Kuhn embarks on an exercise in cultural memory

As the first in an occasional series of blogs showcasing assets in the Cinema Memory Archive relating to project planning, conduct and outreach, what follows is the text of a brief talk given as part of a panel discussion on ‘Children and Cinema’ at the Society for Cinema Studies Annual Meeting in Chicago in March 2000. [SCS Conference Talk 2000 Folder, CC-19000OE103]. It broaches some issues that were to become foundational for all subsequent explorations of cinema memory in the research projects Cinema Culture in 1930s Britain and Cinema Memory and the Digital Archive.

*

When people talk about their memories, they tell stories, they narrate.  The idea of story is often associated with fiction, i.e. something not actual, not ‘true’, ‘made up’.  I don’t use ‘story’ in these senses.  It’s my contention rather that all stories, even conscious ‘lies’, carry truths of some sort, and that these are readable  both in the stories people tell about their own lives and in the ways they tell them. They are evidence, they contain clues, and they can be mined for cultural and historical insights.

My talk today draws on memory-stories of youthful cinemagoing; and I shall draw out some of the implications of these stories for an understanding of ‘cinema memory’ as a distinctive variant of cultural memory.

The stories are taken from material gathered for an ongoing research project, Cinema Culture in 1930s Britain, in the course of which depth interviews were conducted some years ago with over eighty mostly volunteer interviewees living in various parts of Britain who were asked about their recollections of ‘going to the pictures’ in the 1930s. Most of these men and women were children or adolescents during the thirties.

A certain pattern emerges in the sorts of things that they recollect–in the immediate themes  of their memory-stories, that is. These themes are in some degree shaped by the interview schedule. Although interviews were open and non-directive, they usually opened, as a means of getting informants into thinking about their past,  with a question about the first remembered visit to the cinema. This would lead naturally into recollections of related issues: cinema buildings, cinema programmes, getting in to the cinema, films.

While the interview material does not lend itself to quantitative analysis, it is very apparent that some of these issues are recollected more regularly, at greater length, or more vividly, than others.

There is a  pattern, too, in how informants organise the narration of  their memory-stories. Throughout the interviews memory talk observably breaks down into three main types:

Firstly, anecdotal memory: first-person narration of a one-off story in which the narrator is involved in the recollected events.

…The first film I ever remember was going to a cinema in Maryhill Road called the Blythswood. And I had pleaded with my parents to let me go, and I must have been about nine and I was told I could go and it was called The Four Sons. [laughs] And we went, I went to the cinema on my own, and I was allowed to go to the first showing at 2 o’clock. And I went with a friend to the first showing and in these days you just sat right on. There was no change of, no going out. You just went any, in the middle, or any time you walked in, if you paid your fare. So at the end of that my friend said– “I have to go, Helen.” And it just, as I say, went on again. I said “I think I’ll watch it again.” So I sat on and watched it again and I got out, got up to come out and was passing a friend with her parents and she said “Aw, come on, sit beside me. Don’t go out, Helen. Just sit with me.” [laughs] So I sat through it again! And as the end of it her parents were going and she said to her parents, “Could I sit through this again?’ and they said ‘Well, if Helen’ll stay.” [laughs] I sat through that film four times. [laughing] And it was a very sad film. I must have been, if I’d saved my tears, I could probably have swum out of there. And when I got out, my father was waiting, absolutely in a terrible state and didn’t know what had happened to me. They’d gone round all my friends and looking for me and the people at the cinema said, no they couldn’t interrupt the show, they’d just have to wait till I came out. And my dad was, he was so glad to see me, [laughs] he couldn’t make up his mind whether to murder me or welcome me. So, my mum welcomed me home but said “If you ever do that again, you’ll never get back to the cinema again!”  Helen Smeaton, Glasgow, 23 January 1995. HS-92-036AT001


Secondly, individual repetitive memory: regular events in which the narrator is involved (‘I often’, ‘my mother and I used to’, etc).

Erm, yes. Well we had maids in those days and erm, and they were very often more eh, not more important. They were, they were good girls. And they used to, on their days off, sometimes take me to the cinema. Beatrice Cooper, Harrow, 20 July 1995. BC-95-208AT001


Thirdly, collective or distanced repetitive memory: similar to individual repetitive memory, but incorporating a sense of distance: unspecified protagonists are identified as  ‘they’ or ‘we’.

You know, they were joyous occasions. We went and we came out and we thoroughly enjoyed it. Mind you, with the old silents, we came out terrified. As I said, the children’s matinee was on a Saturday afternoon and we used to go and  see these silent films with black and white with the piano playing. Denis Houlston, Manchester, 26 April 1995. DH-95-034AT001

*

I want now to examine three case studies of memories of childhood cinemagoing. These represent intersections of specific themes and discourses that emerge insistently across informants’ accounts. They centre firstly on the location of cinemas that informants recollect going to as children, secondly on ways of getting in to the cinema, and thirdly on the films themselves.

These three groups of memory-stories follow, as it were, a journey from home towards and then into a cinema or cinemas. But it is noteworthy that while every informant’s account contains elements of at least one of the abovementioned groups, all three rarely if ever emerge with equal weight, or indeed at all, in any single account.

  • Location: memories of particular cinemas and their place in local topographies, in relation to home, etc.  This references a more general observation about cinema memory–that in their memory-stories informants navigate mental maps of their childhood neighbourhoods, maps on which they are remarkably keen to pinpoint the precise locations of ‘their’ cinemas.  This is associated with a spatial and embodied quality to the narration, which inscribes a bodily memory of walking familiar streets between home and the cinema.  While as a rule this tends to be associated with repetitive memory discourse, in cases where informants are recalling their very earliest cinema visits it may be accompanied by an anecdotal memory.

The first time I ever mind [remember] being to a cinema was the old Annfield cinema in the Gallowgate. Now, I don’t know if you know that area. […] But there’s a hotel down there, it’s used as a working men’s club nowadays, you know. But it used to, it was the Bellgrove Hotel. Now, on that side, where the Bellgrove Hotel stood, was the old Annfield cinema. And that was the first picturehouse that I was ever in. That I can remember. My dad took me to it.  Thomas McGoran, Glasgow, 30 November 1994. TM-92-009AT001

  • Getting in: many informants have something to say about price of admission to the cinema.

When mum got her wages on a Friday she would splash out and take us to the Astoria on Possil Road, it cost sixpence for adults and threepence for kids.  Beside the pictures there was a wee shop that sold homemade sweets.  Never since then have I tasted sweets like those.  I used to press my face against the window and drool, candy balls, humbugs, macaroon, pink and white tablet, yum!  Mary McCusker, Glasgow, ‘Going to the Pictures’. MM-92-008AR001

Mrs McCusker’s words, which are characterised by repetitive enunciation, touch on a topic that arises frequently: splashing out on a trip to the pictures when you have to watch the pennies.  It is part of a wider theme running through many informants’ stories–memories of resourcefully  ‘making do’ or ‘getting by’ which sometimes involve acts of improvisation.

We used to have a cinema that was called The Cinema. That all us kids used to queue up to get in there about two o’clock. And if you didn’t have enough money to pay, I think it was a penny or tuppence to get in in them days.. […] You could take a jam jar or a rabbit skin. Phyllis Bennett, Norwich, 27 October 1995. PB-95-222AT001


As in Mrs Bennett’s account most, perhaps all, versions of the ‘jam jar story’ are marked by a distanced version of repetitive enunciation: generally speaking there is relatively little concrete detail of where, what and with whom (‘all us kids’).  This observation sheds light on  how memory material might be evaluated and on the sorts of evidence (historical? cultural?) it constitutes.  Are ‘jam jar stories’ similar in their discursive structure to urban myths?

  • Films: informants are far less likely to remember individual films or details from films than  to recall other aspects of their early cinemagoing. While memories of particular films are rare, memories that do come up are without exception anecdotal: they arise in stories in which the informant/narrator is at the centre of events and in which the events themselves always have to do with their own remembered response to the film.  For example,  a number of informants  report having nightmares after seeing horrific scenes in films (interestingly, during the 1930s frightening films were a prominent focus of public concerns about the effects of cinema on children).

And I can remember, eh, this particular film, Dr Fu Manchu . And that night I came home and had a nightmare about Dr Fu Manchu. The Chinese man, with the big long nail. And my mother vowed, that was the last picture I was ever to see. I was never to get back again. Both [parents] were up all night with me with this nightmare of Dr Fu Manchu. I could see him walking through the kitchen. Mary McCusker, Glasgow, 22 November 1994. MM-92-008AT001

*

What do these findings about the themes and discourses of  childhood memories of cinemagoing suggest about cinema memory as a variant of cultural memory?  I have some tentative suggestions to offer.

  • While this is probably not associated exclusively with cinema memory, it is perhaps worth noting the insistence, in informants’ accounts of their youthful cinemagoing, on  subverting adult restrictions or transcending the limitations imposed by poverty. What, however, are we to make of the oft-recollected example  of ‘getting by’ which is specific to cinemagoing–and which has entered the common currency of cinema memory–namely,  the ‘jam jar story’ and its variants?
  • More specifically, the insistence on spatiality in cinema memory is interesting; not only in that for many informants memories of cinemagoing have more to do with recollected topographies of childhood neighbourhoods than with particular films, but more significantly in that these familiar spaces are often  (re)constructed and negotiated through informants’ memory-talk.
  • Some accounts link discursive spatiality with embodied practices of memory. These are apparent not only in accounts which discursively re-enact informants’ journeys on foot through familiar streets to get to a cinema; but also with remembered images from films and responses associated with these usually isolated, disassociated, images.

 

The CMA assets cited above can be accessed via links on the CMDA website or consulted in both physical and digital form in the Cinema Memory Archive at Lancaster University, by appointment with Special Collections and Archives. 

If you wish to cite and/or re-use any CMA materials, please consult  the CMDA website for information on copyright and using the materials from the collection and for a citation referencing guide.

 

Post-2000 explorations of cinema memory include:

  • Annette Kuhn, An Everyday Magic: Cinema and Cultural Memory. London: Bloomsbury, 2002, pp.9-12; Chapter 2.
  • Annette Kuhn, Daniel Biltereyst and Philippe Meers, ‘Memories of cinemagoing and film experience: an introduction’. Memory Studies, vol.10, no.1 (2017), pp.3-16.
  • Annette Kuhn, Exploring Cinema Memory. Edinburgh: Argyll Publishing, 2023.