The Memory Process in the Commemorations of the Dead in West African Newspapers

Abstract

Abstract

en This chapter considers the memoryprocess in the commemorations ofthe dead inasample of newspapers from Nigeria and Liberia from the 1940s to1960s.At its centreare the obituaries and in-memoriams of middle-toupper-class citizens published by familymembers and the state. The chapter homesin on howanumber of journalisticprocesses, from“signalling”to“masking”to“controlling,”wereusedto capturespecific elements of the past and,moresignificantly, to guide the present and futureself-fashioning of the African elite.