Tracing and reconstructing cultural memory through photographs: Railway workers

The conceptual underpinnings of remembrance and where collective memories are preserved have been a matter of debate since Ancient Greece. The concept of collective memory was initially discussed in its abstract forms, and then the existence of concrete forms were emphasized. The concept of social memory, the beginning of the discussions on memory in social sciences and in humanities, has focused on the social origins of the topic of memory having been considered to be individual in the past; therefore, laying emhphasis on the process of interrelation between the individual identity and social memory is of great significance in terms of the agenda of the present study. In the present study, the meaning of concrete forms of memory was interpreted sociologically. The fact that the individual memory has social context has led to new approaches in social sciences. The concept that define, as a cultural activity, remembrance by transferring past events to the present constitute the main theoretical framework of the present study, allowing for the study to be carried out phenomenologically. To understand the formation and tranmission of cultural memory, in the present study, the reflections of social memory on visual images are dealt with. When sampling in the research, the aspects of cultural memory approaches were taken into consideration, and the cultural partnership of those individuals who shared certain time and place were focused on. Individuals who developed cultural partnerships by taking part in the same cultural structure and transferred them to the next generations by preserving them in their memories constitute the population of the present research. The research traces cultural memory through the photographs of TCDD employees, who identify themselves as railroders. KEYWORDS: Cultural Memory, Visual Sociology, Photograph, Railway Workers, Phenomenology.