The Memoryscapes: Hiroshima City Over Time

The Memoryscapes: Hiroshima City Over Time Yu Jie Chen

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Table of Contents 04 Introduction 06 Urban Collective Production 08 Collective Memories Over Time: Hiroshima, Japan 12 Exhibition: The Artifacts

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INTRODUCTION

In the 1920s, sociologist Maurice Halbwachs presented the concept of collective memory, analyzing the way humans interact with their memories while arguing the strength of spatial images to be remembered. It completely opened up a new perspective to the way people understand the way people think.

“Why does a person become attached to objects? Why does he wish that they would never change and cold always keep him company? Our physical surroundings bear our and others’ imprint”1. It started from the individual memories that people had on certain objects over a period of a time, then they started to develop their relationships with the objects. The relationship could cause delight, sadness, anger and other emotions in certain events which gave imprints to the memory of the individuality. Those imprints could be from the way people layout their homes with specific furniture they used like the organizations of chairs and tables. It was proved that the same layout appears even if people move to new places because people remember the objects as a group2. It is a group that transforms the space and adapts to the built environment. It creates spatial images in the mind just like something that tells people where the things should be according to the collective memories.

Through the relationships with people, time, space, and objects, collective memory can be defined as the outcome in a gathered activity with people who remember the past for being a part of the community or a group3. Over the history, there were different major events engaged in micro and macro scales that often recalled a certain group’s collective memory about the past. It is the collective memory that defines the identity of the place and the group through artifacts.

These memories encoded itself into urbanism through time, they created things that housed the events everywhere in the city within popular culture. The urban collective memories of Hiroshima in Japan, one of the major cities that collective memory played significant roles which influenced the present of the city, created some of the most symbolic transformations of the city through time in the context of social, political, and cultural issues. The exhibition opens up the investigation of the collective memories of Hiroshima as the cultural setting over time using artifacts.

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1. Halbwachs, Maurice, 1877-1945 and Lewis A. Coser 1913-2003. 1992. On Collective Memory. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

2. Ibid.

3. Moliner, P. and Bovina, I., 2019. Architectural Forms of Collective Memory. International Review of Social Psychology, 32(1), p.12. DOI: http://doi. org/10.5334/irsp.236

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Credit: Book Cover of On Collective Memory by Maurice Halbwachs

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URBAN COLLECTIVE PRODUCTION How did memories form in cities as a collective production? It started from the way different social groups remember the history in particular places of a city.

It can be through places like theaters, public spaces, and streets that people protested on. If people pay attention closely to their surrounding environments, they might recognize that memories are buried in their everyday lives that they didn’t realize. Some of the places triggered a sense of nostalgia due to its romantic or dramatic interactions with people. “Most significantly, there is often an implicit discourse of continuity between past and present, between older uses and meanings of space and newer ones. Complex lived histories are transformed into melodrama through an emphasis on seemingly universal themes of human feeling, triumph, tragedy, and struggle”4. Bélanger stated the relationship between the past and present changed through time with use of space. Memory plays an important role in the social lives of the people in the city. One place could have new uses after a certain period that one lived through with different stages of emotions. These emotions left imprints in one’s mind which turned them into memories at the end. The civic life that people experience in the urban space in embedded in the collective process with different groups of people understanding each other through “distinctive signs and vision of the city”5.

Reflecting back from the theory of spatial imaging from Maurice Halbwachs, there was a relationship between space and historical events that produced the dialogue of “communality of use”6, meaning that the events being held at the space shares its use with different groups of people that produce different dialogues which links to the production of memory. For example, there could be a street market that people in the past would go everyday for socializing. After some years of transformation, the street became a place for heavy traffics where tourists pass through to experience the bustling of urban life. These are two different experiences that people could experience at the same place while producing different memories in the dialogue. This also shows how the collective memory of a city changes over time with different transformations.

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4. Bélanger, Anouk. “URBAN SPACE AND COLLECTIVE MEMORY: ANALYSING THE VARIOUS DIMENSIONS OF THE PRODUCTION OF MEMORY.” Canadian Journal of Urban Research, vol. 11, no. 1, 2002, pp. 69–92. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/44320695. Accessed 2 May 2020.

5. Ibid.

6. Lefebvre, Henri. 1991. The Production of Space, Boston: Beacon Press.

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According to Bélanger’s point about the media as a part of the urban process of collective memory, it was insisted that “histories and memories of spaces and places are bound up with the stories which are told about them, how these stories are told, and which history turns out to be dominant”7 from Massey’s point 8 . The media gives a narrative about places in the city in historical events. Some of the media can be biased and provided false information in the way things are told that might change the way people understand memories. These media like television, newspaper, and radio were some forms that certain groups depend on for information in a cultural context. As a collective production, it defines the representation of a group’s common identity in the past affected by cognitive and emotional factors9. It produces collective memory for certain groups of people that circulates around the city.

The relationship between groups and individuals are established in the designs of the city. “When a neighborhood suffers demolition or decay, the individual in habitant feels that ‘a whole part of himself is dying,’ whereas the group resists that assault ‘with all the force of its traditions’ and ‘endeavors to hold firm or reshape itself in a district or on a street that is no longer ready-made for it but was once its own’ ”10. It is argued that the image of the city is a collective memory that made the people feel so attached to it with emotional appeals. When “their images” are being destroyed or replaced, they fight back for the originality of the image that is so important in their memories socially. Those memories are the lived time of people and that’s why people are so important in the part of the urban collective memories.

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7. Bélanger, Anouk. “URBAN SPACE AND COLLECTIVE MEMORY: ANALYSING THE VARIOUS DIMENSIONS OF THE PRODUCTION OF MEMORY.” Canadian Journal of Urban Research, vol. 11, no. 1, 2002, pp. 69–92. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/44320695. Accessed 2 May 2020.

8. Massey, Doreen. 1992. “Politics and Space/Time” The New Left Review 196: 65-84.

9. Moliner, P. and Bovina, I., 2019. Architectural Forms of Collective Memory. International Review of Social Psychology, 32(1), p.12. DOI: http://doi. org/10.5334/irsp.236 10. Chisholm, Dianne. “The City of Collective Memory.” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 7, no. 2 (2001): 195-243. https://www.muse.jhu.edu/ article/12163.

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COLLECTIVE MEMORIES OVER TIME: HIROSHIMA, JAPAN Maurice Halbwachs published On Collective Memory in the political context of World War II, where there were many traumatic memories that took place and were still remembered by people as of today. Traumatic memories are something people couldn’t forget about and it affects the present in many ways. Hiroshima, one of the cities in Japan, experienced one of the most traumatic and powerful events in remembering the history during World War II. The city itself was remembered for being bombed by the USA that killed many people’s lives and destroyed the fabric of the city. Before the atomic bombing, the memories from the people of the city were very different compared to after the bomb and to today.

The historical events changed the collective memories of Hiroshima over time from different groups of people that sparked the justifications on the way people remember things. This revealed their identities.

At the beginning of the Showa Era (1926-1989), Hiroshima was known as a major transportation hub in Japan. The city provided many well known institutions for higher education which also made the city into a military city11. Before the atomic bomb in 1945, Hiroshima was a city considered for military importance. It was known for “a communications center, a storage point, and an assembly area for troops”12. At the center of the city, the architecture is made with reinforced concrete buildings that were built in strong constructions and standard to prevent earthquakes13. Outside the center of the city, there was a density of small wooden workshops and houses with a few industrial plants. The collective memory at this time period could be represented through the artifact of a postcard that recorded Hiroshima’s city vibe that was so dynamic, “the hustle and bustle of Hiroshima’s streets is depicted in postcards...reveals a city full of energy, and yet, the war was impacting nearly every aspect of peoples’ lives”14. This shows how things were very positive in the everyday lives of the city. The city was used for higher education, transportation, and the flourishing shopping districts by different groups of people. At this stage of the time, these elements formed spatial images of a cheerful collective memory to represent the city of Hiroshima.

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11. “Hiroshima Before the Bombing.” Special Exhibition Hiroshima, 1945 −A-bomb Damage Revealed in Photographs. Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, n.d. http://www.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/virtual/VirtualMuseum_e/exhibit_e/exh1202_e/exh120213_e.html.

12. “The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.” Description of the Cities Before the Bombings | The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki | Historical Documents. National Science Digital Library, n.d. http://www.atomicarchive.com/Docs/MED/med_chp6.shtml.

13. Ibid.

14. “Hiroshima Before the Bombing.” Special Exhibition Hiroshima, 1945 −A-bomb Damage Revealed in Photographs. Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, n.d. http://www.pcf.city.hiroshima.jp/virtual/VirtualMuseum_e/exhibit_e/exh1202_e/exh120213_e.html.

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When the USA President Truman decided to drop the atomic bomb in Hiroshima to end the Pacific War on August 6, 1945. Hiroshima was severely destroyed with blast of heat and radiation that took approximately 140,000 people’s lives by the end of 194515. The people who survived had to go through a long period of physical and emotional injuries. “At 8:15 A.M., the bomb exploded with a blinding flash in the sky, and the great rush of air and a loud rumble of noise extended for many miles around the city; the first blas was soon followed by the sounds of falling buildings and of growing fires, and a great cloud of dust and smoke began to cast a pall of darkness over the city”16. These descriptions of the event portrayed Chisholm’s point at the beginning show when a city faces demolition or decay, individuals are also feeling a part of themselves is dying with the city 17 . It was the memories that made the people feel to be part of the city as whole.

They felt that the memories were dying, the flourishing memories of Hiroshima that they had in the transportation hub, workshops, and busy streets. These places suddenly disappeared after the bomb and it was so painful both physically and emotionally to the residents. This history event left a disastrous imprint on the city of Hiroshima that destroyed most of the architectures in the city that people used to engage in their social lives. The collective memory at this stage was an absolute trauma for many people that gave a new identity to the city. The identity of being bombed, destroyed, and hurted. The artifact of photography that captured the destroyed city and people lying on the ground injured spoke a heavy weight to the memories. It made the memory of the city unforgettable to many people.

After World War II ended, the city of Hiroshima started different stages of recovering to today that gives different identities than before. People started to rebuild buildings, transportation systems, and businesses. In 1988, a proposal by an inquiry commission to vision the new Hiroshima city as an “International Peace and Cultural City” with further development of high technology and internationalization18. The nation was trying to give new images to the city that focused on world peace. The site was more special than other cities in Japan because this was the first site of nuclear war and a “mecca for peace pilgrimages”19. Hiroshima was undergoing a few urban renewal projects like the Peace Memorial Park and Atom Bomb Dome. _______________

15. “The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.” Description of the Cities Before the Bombings | The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki | Historical Documents. National Science Digital Library, n.d. http://www.atomicarchive.com/Docs/MED/med_chp6. shtml.

16. Ibid.

17. Chisholm, Dianne. “The City of Collective Memory.” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 7, no. 2 (2001): 195-243. https:// www.muse.jhu.edu/article/12163.

18. Yoneyama, Lisa. “Taming the Memoryscape: Hiroshima’s Urban Renewal.” In Remapping Memory: The Politics of TimeSpace, edited by Boyarin Jonathan, by Tilly Charles, 99-136. University of Minnesota Press, 1994. Accessed May 2, 2020. www.jstor.org/stable/10.5749/j.ctttt82h.7.

19. Ibid.

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The Peace Memorial Park accommodates a number of museums and monuments in the city. However, due to the power of collective memory, urban designers doubt about connecting with peace because the city is linked to the atomic bomb experience. The collective memory in this time period of the city was at the intersection of the past and the present. Ichitani argued that here were still many people who kept their collective memory in the past from the manga, Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms20. The author of the manga named the characters after the regions in Hiroshima that were destroyed in showing remembering the collective memory of the past. The people who would mostly keep the collective memory in atomic bombs were the groups of survivors that were heavily injured physically and emotionally. On the other hand, there are other groups that try to have a positive collective memory of the city focused more on the present side but still have some past side of the memories. They are the groups of people from higher administration who wanted to give new images to the city that are something bright and cheerful, “we cannot forever rely on the Atom Bomb Dome or Peace Memorial Park. We are aiming to get rid of the gloominess. It is not desirable to bring in any political color, for people are allergic to it”21.

Overall, the collective memories in the city of Hiroshima changed over time. It started from the cheerfulness of the bustling city life to traumatic emotional and physical injuries by the atomic bomb experience to the intersection of staying the past and present in post-war. As of today, Hiroshima became a bustling manufacturing hub with populations over one million people that promotes world peace. The architecture of the city looks completely different than before. The future generations might have newer interpretations of the city with their collective memories living in the new image, but it still produces the dialogue in the communality of use. The collective memory still remains in the intersection of the past and present for current and older generation groups. And that’s how memories define different identities of a city over time. It is important that we need to continue to “question why and how we remember-for what purpose, for whom, and from which position we remember-even when discussing sites of memory, where to many the significance of remembrance seems obvious”22. Now, it’s up to the visitors to experience the artifacts that represented the collective memories of Hiroshima.

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20. Ichitani, Tomoko. “Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms: The Renarrativation of Hiroshima Memories.” Journal of Narrative Theory 40, no. 3 (2010): 364-390. https://www.muse.jhu.edu/article/408655.

21. Yoneyama, Lisa. “Taming the Memoryscape: Hiroshima’s Urban Renewal.” In Remapping Memory: The Politics of TimeSpace, edited by Boyarin Jonathan, by Tilly Charles, 99-136. University of Minnesota Press, 1994. Accessed May 2, 2020. www.jstor.org/stable/10.5749/j.ctttt82h.7.

22. Yoneyama, Lisa. Hiroshima Traces : Time, Space, and the Dialectics of Memory. Twentieth-Century Japan. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999. http://search.ebscohost.com.libezproxy2.syr.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=e000xna&AN=390457&site=ehost-live.

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Credit: Architectural rendered scenes from “In This Corner of the World� (2016) directed by Sunao Katabuchi

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Exhibition: The Artifacts

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Well-known Hiroshima Locations in Postcards These are the postcards that depicted Hiroshima as a bustling city with people’s everyday lives before the atomic bombing in between 1926-1945. The scenes are some of the most well-known locations in the city that people always visit. From the attractive valley with lanterns to famous shopping districts and to Hiroshima University of Literature and Science, Hiroshima Higher Normal School (later became Hiroshima University). The city was known for a major transportation hub in Japan. The architecture of the city was mostly made with reinforced concrete and wooden materials for workshops. The postcards “reveal a city full of energy”23, it seems like life was so vivid and dynamic that everyone enjoys living in the city of Hiroshima.

The postcards are one of the first artifacts that revealed the collective memory that people have had about Hiroshima as a city. They recorded these beautiful places in the city into postcards to let others remember the vivid lives there. But also it’s used to trigger one’s memory about the city. The collective memories at that stage of the time were full of very energetic and enthusiastic attitudes from the people about different places. These collective memories also represented the identity of Hiroshima at that time. It was the urban identity of a well socially-constructed city for people.

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23. “Hiroshima Before the Bombing.” Special Exhibition Hiroshima, 1945 −Hiroshima Before the Bombing. Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, n.d.

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Credit: Pictures donated by Kenichi Kawarazaki (upper-left), Teruhisa Shimizu (middle-left), Michiko Kawakami (lower-left), and Teruhisa

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“In This Corner of the World ” Rendered Scene “In This Corner of the World”, a Japanese anime drama film directed by Sunao Katabuchi released in 2016, talked about the lives of people in Hiroshima in between the 1930s to 1940s and the atomic bomb. This artifact shows one of the rendered scenes in the film that depicted what city life looked like in the 1930s to the 1940s in Hiroshima. The scene was formed under many interviews with the survivors to recall the city before the atomic bombing. The rendered scene shows one of the lantern streets in Hiroshima, there were many people walking on the street and socializing with each other in storefronts vividly. It also shows the general architecture sense of Hiroshima, like the wooden workshops and concrete department stores.

This rendered scene was another important part of showing the collective memories of Hiroshima before the atomic bomb. The scene gave a strong sense of urban life with social interactions. Some people were feeling attached to different places of the city like the workshops and the shopping district that they started to develop strong spatial images and memories with it. It shows the dialogue of communiality of use, how places are shared by people with different uses. The director of the film also stated the power of collective memory from the survivors, “all that information came out from the memories of the people we interviewed”24.

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24. Desowitz, Bill. “‘In This Corner of the World’: Animating Hiroshima Before the Bomb.” IndieWire. IndieWire, November 29, 2017. https://www.indiew-

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Credit: Architectural rendered scenes from “In This Corner of the World� (2016) directed by Sunao Katabuchi

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Banzai Troops Banzai troops referred to the Japanese soldiers who chose to fight until the death. It’s a suicidal type of tactic in war for the soldiers to fight against the American soldiers. The Japanese soldiers chose to sacrifice for the countries under the term “Banzai”, meaning attacking fiercely and recklessly while showing respect to the emperor. There were people in Hiroshima saw the departure of Banzai troops, “to quote a Japanese report, ‘probably more than a thousand times since the beginning of the war did the Hiroshima citizens see off with cries of ‘Banzai’ the troops leaving from the harbor’ ”25. There were families who were crying for them because they might never come back from the war.

This artifact of images started to show the collective memories of the city started to change at the beginning of World War II. It changed from a mood of happiness to sadness when people are seeing their loved ones becoming Banzai troops for war and they might never come back because of the suicidal tactic they are using. And that was the memory they started to have. These memories took place in the harbor in the city of Hiroshima that defines the identity of sadness at that stage of the time. With the spatial images, the scene became hard to forget about these troops leaving.

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25. “The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.” Description of the Cities Before the Bombings | The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki | Historical Documents. National Science Digital Library, n.d. http://www.atomicarchive.com/Docs/MED/med_chp6.shtml.

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Credit: http://ww2inpictures.tumblr.com/post/73516011676/japanese-soldiers-supported-by-tankettes-assault

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Photography These were the photos taken after the city of Hiroshima was bombed on August 6, 1945. The entire city was destroyed and devastated severely, most of the buildings were crushed off into pieces and falling apart. All the places that people used to hangout were gone. There were people injured and physically and emotionally who were trying to escape from the bombing. There were also countless dead bodies with blood on the ground covered by the pieces from the buildings falling apart. People were dying from the bomb and some of them were crying about the loss of their loved ones. The scenes were egregiously traumatic. The city was covered by crushed ashes.

These photos had been one of the strongest artifacts to show the collective memories of Hiroshima after the atomic bomb to anyone. The collective memory was traumatic remembering about all these scenes of the city getting devastated and people dying. All the places that people had important memories like the shopping district, communications center, and homes were all gone. It could be very painful to view these photos, some were scared to look at these photos because it made them feel a part of them was dying with the city when they are so attached to Hiroshima in their memories. The memories at this time period showed the identity of the city was full of death and despair.

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Credit: AP Images

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Drawings from Children These are the drawings drawn by the survivors of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima that were collected by the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. The drawings recorded the survivors’ memories during that traumatic day. In this drawing, survivor Torazuchi Mastunaga “remembered soldiers carrying children’s corpses on stretchers to a temporary crematorium. ‘These children had been injured by the bomb and taken to the army hospital for treatment but had soon died,’ she said.

‘The hands and legs sticking out of the stretcher swung with the motion. My chest suddenly seized with emotion’ ”26. The drawing revealed a lot of the emotions to draw the scene after the bomb.

Drawings like these take the power of the collective memory to remember about the scenes in Hiroshima. The survivors from the atomic bomb had a completely different image of the city compared to the memory before the bomb about the vivid lives of the city. It showed how the collective memories of Hiroshima changed over time to represent the identity of the city. The survivors were heavily impacted by the event and it was unforgettable to them. It’s something that they will remember forever of the memory of the loved ones of their lives dying.

The event changed the city to a new identity of war and death.

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26. “Drawings Show Haunting Memories of Hiroshima.” CNN. Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, August 4, 2015.

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Credit: Torazuchi Matsunaga/Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum (top) and Asako Fujise/Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum (bottom)

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People’s Belongings from the War These are the clothes that survived through the atomic bomb of Hiroshima to the people who died in the blast. There were men and women’s clothes, some pieces were broken into pieces with holes from the bomb, ranging from uniforms to shirts to skirts and to socks. There were several clothings that people put their names on. These clothes are the artifacts of the war time that represented how people have been destroyed and killed. They represented the collective memory that people had for the city of Hiroshima during the war time. Imagine their families found their clothings left in the ground of ashes but not the lovely people, how sad would they be when they saw these and touched them? Every clothing has important memories to them, like they might be shirts as a gift for graduation, skirts from lovers for birthdays, and pants that a family plaited for their baby. And then the people were gone who once used to wear these belongings from their loved ones. It’s very painful as inside of them are bleeding as it expresses the realities. All of these are collective memories that take place at homes, streets, and parks in the city. The artifacts are the reflection of the atomic bomb and war in Hiroshima.

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Credit: All images courtesy of the artist, Ishiuchi Miyako

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Poem from Poet Kurihara Sadako This was an artifact of one of the unpublished poems created by Kurihara Sadako (1913-2005) founded by Hiroshima Jogakuin University. Kurihara Sadako was a well-known poet whose works focused on the lives during the atomic bomb in Hiroshima. The poem, Let Us be Midwives!, talked about the story of a seriously injured midwife helping a woman in a childbirth at a basement after the atomic bomb. The new life was born and the midwife died at the end due to her injuries from the bomb. (In reality, the midwife in the poem actually survived)27. She sacrificed herself at the cost of her life to help others. This attitude was recorded

by Kurihara Sadako that she also felt “we enter a world of darkness in which the doomed and bewildered are called to live beyond despair by becoming midwives of hope”28.

This shows the collective memory from the poet after Hiroshima was bombed and her experience in the basement. When everyone was despaired, she was more trying to give hope to people to keep people alive when everyone was hopeless from the war of the darkness period. She realized she needs to live and survive. The piece of the memory portrayed the city was full of darkness and hopelessness.

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27. “Let Us Be Midwives! An Untold Story of the Atomic Bombing.” Society of African Missions, July 27, 2019. https://sma.ie/let-us-be-midwives-an-untold-story-of-the-atomic-bombing/.

28. Ibid.

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Credit: Poem by Kurihara Sadako

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Manga, “Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms” Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms by Fumiyo Kono published in 2003. This manga illustrated the stories of a family of survivors of the atomic bombing in Hiroshima. The main character, Minami Hirano, who survived the bomb with her mother and brother while she lost her father and two sisters during the bomb. She often flashed back about the horror scenes of her family members dying from radiation poisoning. Most of the characters’ names were named after the places that were attached in Hiroshima. The manga was wellknown internationally and promoted the ideas about anti-war.

Minami was having long-term trauma from the atomic bomb and seeing victims dying in the manga. That also reflects the standpoint from the author of the manga, that she wanted to show this part of trauma from the character to the audience about the collective memory she had for the city of Hiroshima. An identity of people dying and horror that she can never forget about. Also, the use of the names in the manga also reflects the urban collective memories “by employing local place means as character names, which are immediately recognizable to people who live or used to live in Hiroshima, Kouno attempts to represent memories of the city that are not reduced into the discourse of Hiroshima as the showcase of international peace”29. This way of showing the names of places in Hiroshima reflects the author’s memories about different places there that were so important to her. Hiroshima went through different stages of recovering after the atomic bomb while the administration wanted to give a new identity to the image of the city by promoting peace. The collective memory during that time was at the intersection of the past and the present. Many people couldn’t forget the memory of the bombing while there were some groups who tried to keep the memories in the past and add new memories about peace.

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29. Ichitani, Tomoko. “Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms: The Renarrativation of Hiroshima Memories.” Journal of Narrative Theory 40, no. 3 (2010): 364-390. https://www.muse.jhu.edu/article/408655.

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Credit: Excerpt from the manga, “Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms” by Fumiyo Kono

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Cenotaph for the A-bomb Victims, Memorial Monument for Hiroshima, City of Peace The artifact of this cenotaph was designed by Kenzo Tange in 1952. Kenzo Tange was a professor at the University of Tokyo with a wish to reconstruct Hiroshima as a city of peace. The roof was designed in this curved downward shape to represent the Japanese ancient clay house with the purpose to shelter the souls of the victims who died from the atomic bomb in Hiroshima30. The monument is inscribed with the words of “Let all the souls here rest in peace, for we shall not repeat the evil”31. There were still many unknown victim names in the registry of the stone chamber. The cenotaph was located in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park, it was one of the urban renewal projects when Hiroshima was recovering from the atomic bomb.

The Cenotaph represents the collective memory that people had for the atomic bomb experience but in a modern setting at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. At this stage, the collective memory is at the intersection of the past and the present time. The Cenotaph reminds people of the memories of the victims who died in the war in Hiroshima and the design reminds people of the architecture that used to be there in the city. Every year on August 6 at the Park, people will be putting paper lanterns on the Motoyasu River for a day of remembrance.

There would also be different events at the Park every year to remember about the history while promoting peace at the same time. The world will not forget what happened at the city of Hiroshima on that day.

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30. “Cenotaph for the A-Bomb Victims (Memorial Monument for Hiroshima, City of Peace): A-Bombed Buildings & Cenotaph, Etc.: Explore HIROSHIMA : Hiroshima City & Regional Area Official Tourism Website.” Explore HIROSHIMA, n.d. https://www.hiroshima-navi.or.jp/en/post/007122.html.

31. Ibid.

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Credit: 2017 Richard F. Ebert

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Downtown Hiroshima, th Future The artifact is the entire downtown Hiroshima this time today that looks completely different from how the city looked like either before the bomb or after. In 1995, the city of Hiroshima initiated the project called Hiroshima 2045: City of Peace and Creativity to “create social infrastructures with superior design characteristics as Hiroshima moves through the next fifty years to 2045”32. It was an important initiative that brought Hiroshima to where it is today and continues for the future with different urban renewal projects forming a future cityscape.

Downtown Hiroshima became a bustling manufacturing hub with populations over one million people.

You could see from the artifact that there were bustling vehicles and rails on the street passing through the city. The city is adding new collective memories and identities for future generations. The new groups will have new memories about the city like visiting the new high rise shopping malls, street food districts, and looking at the beautiful cityscape. As Hiroshima is in the process of becoming the City of Peace and Creativity, it shows how collective memories change over time to represent cities. However, the past memories of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima will be unforgettable that marked strong imprints in people’s memories.

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32. “Hiroshima 2045: City of Peace and Creativity.” The City of Hiroshima, n.d. https://www.city.hiroshima.lg.jp/soshiki/129/7751.html.

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Credit: Jean Chung/Getty Images

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The Memoryscapes: Hiroshima City Over Time Yu Jie Chen

Syracuse University School of Architecture ARC 242 | Britt Eversole

ychen256@syr.edu