Solidarity: a slow memory concept

Wawrzyniak, J and Braber, N ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2611-1190, 2026. Solidarity: a slow memory concept. Memory Studies, 19 (2), pp. 697-712. ISSN 1750-6980

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Abstract

This article rethinks solidarity as a “Slow Memory” concept, drawing on life-story interviews with retired trade unionists across Europe. While often framed as a cornerstone of labor history, solidarity has never held a singular meaning; its uses have shifted across ideological traditions and historical contexts. The article combines conceptual history with the framework of a Slow Memory approach, emphasizing how meaning emerges incrementally through lived experience, affect, and embodied recollection. It identifies how solidarity is remembered both as collective resistance and mutual support, and how its changes are reflected upon across varied working milieus. By framing solidarity as a Slow Memory concept, the article contributes to methodological debates of memory studies more broadly. It invites scholars to move beyond institutionalized and event-centered understandings of memory and foreground the multisited, affective, embodied, and practice-based ways in which memory sustains socially important values amid structural changes.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	Memory Studies
Creators:	Wawrzyniak, J. and Braber, N.
Publisher:	SAGE Publications
Date:	April 2026
Volume:	19
Number:	2
ISSN:	1750-6980
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1177/17506980251413211 DOI 2608338 Other
Rights:	© The Author(s) 2026. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
Divisions:	Schools > School of Arts and Humanities
Record created by:	Melissa Cornwell
Date Added:	17 Apr 2026 09:46
Last Modified:	17 Apr 2026 09:46
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/55561

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