Last week we read of the importance of social memories  -- those memories we have that our not just ours alone but shared with others, whether in the family or at school or nationally. These stories we learned can be just as contradictory as the stories we tell about our lives. Groups telling collective historical stories downplay certain facts and emphasize others.

This week we continue with Schank and Abelson’s examination of story skeletons, those “outlines” of stories that we all have in our heads. We will concentrated on the divorce stories and not delve into the political stories, so you may skip the latter. We see how these skeletons are brought forward to tell a version favorable to the teller, and how skeletons that don’t reflect favorably on the teller are suppressed.

Then we’ll discuss two short stories involving competing versions of events – one, Shiloh by Bobbie Ann Mason,  concerning a probable divorce, the other, “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, a conflict between a mother and daughter over the historical importance of certain objects in the mother’s home. We’ll see again how different individuals can tell different stories of the same event.