Susan Engel Context is everything

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Engel, Susan: Context is everything: the nature of memory. NY: WH Freeman, 1999.

Content: a conversational book about autobiographical memory.

Author’s qualifications: Susan Engel is an academic psychologist. This is her second book about autobiographical memory (the first was about children's narratives).

Readability: Very easy to read. Written in a conversational style.

Accuracy: The writer is a researcher in the field. The research quoted (not a lot) is standard stuff.

Currency: The book was published in 1999 so it is reasonably current.

Comprehensiveness: Although the title seems to imply a wider sphere of interest, the book is in fact only about autobiographical memory. It talks about how we create our personal memories, how we reconstruct them as we talk about them, about the differences between recalling personal memories in conversation vs in a courtroom vs in therapy, about private and public memory, and about how we create our selves through our memories of the past.

Amount of background knoledge assumed: None.

Usefulness: Not directly applicable to the goal of improving your memory, but not bad for giving you a general understanding of autobiographical memory.

Memorability: Memorable by virtue of being clearly written and easily understood, and containing interesting details. However, it is not organized for memorability (reviews, summaries, helpful illustrations, etc). It is a curl-up-with book, not a textbook.

Interest: Autobiographical memory - how we create and recreate our own personal history and the relationship between this and our identity - is an area of fascination to most of us. This is a very readable account that is more aimed at providing a perspective and a broad understanding of the issues, rather than a deeper knowledge of the mechanics of personal memory.

Balance: Obviously the writer has a particular perspective which guides her own research, and her account in this book. It is not a textbook account which aims to tell you the various different approaches to autobiographical memory from different theorists.

Availability:.. Readily available. Amazon prices the paperback version at US$11.96.

Length: Not long. The hardback has 188 pages (including the index).

Includes an index and chapter notes.

Overall rating (reflects my own opinion of the book’s worth, not its usefulness to you): ***