National Museums and Sites of Memory:

Museums and public spaces express a nation's collective identity. They express powerfully the national narrative or perpetuate divided memory. When versions of history conflict, how is documented history told through national museums and public spaces? In Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania today and a major center of Jewish life before the Holocaust, parts of the national history are omitted or marginalized. There is a duel between Jewish memory and Lithuanian minimization of anti-Jewish violence. This failure to reconcile past events with present telling of history is a lesson in divided memory and collective amnesia. Americans have their share of divided memories, notably with respect to the Civil War (or "War between the States") or Westward Expansion (Indian removal or ethnic cleansing).