Remembering the past to reimagine the future

The text discusses how the digital age has inverted the human balance of remembering and forgetting, creating a permanent record of the year 2020. While this 'collective memory' preserves both the failures of governance and the efforts of climate activists and healthcare workers, the author warns of the risks associated with who collects and controls these trillions of digital memories.

• The digital age has shifted the human experience of memory such that recording information is now the default state, whereas forgetting was the default in the pre-digital world.
• The year 2020 is characterized as a 'modern Plague Year' due to Covid-19, which exposed failures in democratic governance and moral accountability, but also highlighted global efforts by front-line workers and youth activists demanding action on the climate crisis.
• The vast amount of digital data constituting 'collective memory' necessitates caution regarding the entities that collect this information and their underlying motives.

APA

Rowley, S. (2020). Remembering the past to reimagine the future. World Association for Christian Communication. https://waccglobal.org/remembering-the-past-to-reimagine-the-future/

Chicago

Rowley, Saskia. Remembering the past to reimagine the future. World Association for Christian Communication, 2020. https://waccglobal.org/remembering-the-past-to-reimagine-the-future/.

Wikipedia

{{cite press release |last1=Rowley |first1=Saskia |title=Remembering the past to reimagine the future |publisher=World Association for Christian Communication |date=21 December 2020 |url=https://waccglobal.org/remembering-the-past-to-reimagine-the-future/ |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@misc{rowley2020remembering, author = {Rowley, Saskia}, title = {{Remembering the past to reimagine the future}}, publisher = {World Association for Christian Communication}, year = {2020}, month = dec, url = {https://waccglobal.org/remembering-the-past-to-reimagine-the-future/}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }