Why do we remember? Mahr & Csibra (M&C) tackle this longstanding philosophical and psychological question by arguing that memories of specific past experiences serve epistemic truth claims; individuals use memories of the personal past to communicate information in order to influence others' beliefs about the world. This communicative function is more successful to the extent that the speaker can provide details of the past episode. I argue that using episodic memories to claim epistemic truth must be placed within sociocultural contexts in which certain truths are privileged (Fivush Reference Fivush, Miller and Scholnick2000; Reference Fivush2010b). Epistemic claims do not succeed through level of detail recalled, but through resonance with those who are hearing and validating that recall (Pasupathi et al. Reference Pasupathi, Fivush and Hernandez-Martinez2016). More specifically, epistemic claims are made from a particular historical and sociocultural position in which particular identities are negotiated and validated (Bordo Reference Bordo and Nicholson1990). Thus, I argue that episodic memories primarily serve to define individual and group identity, and much of this is accomplished through socioculturally structured episodic recall of the emotionally evaluative aspects of personal experiences, rather than the facts of what happened. Moreover, the identity functions of episodic memory are embedded in historically and culturally variable contexts that privilege certain epistemic claims to truth over others.

Unquestionably, talk about the past is ubiquitous in everyday interaction. Individuals share daily occurrences and significant life events, disclosing new experiences to friends and family to better understand and evaluate episodes, presenting specific episodic memories to introduce the self to new acquaintances and retelling shared experiences to bond with others through creating a shared history (Beike et al. Reference Beike, Brandon and Cole2016; Conway et al. Reference Conway, Singer and Tagini2004). We see this beginning early in development as reminiscing develops within family contexts. Parents draw children into sharing the personal past, and even in the preschool years, these conversations focus on emotions and relationships (Fivush Reference Fivush2007). Substantial research demonstrates, through both observation and parental report, that parents and children share their past together in order to help children create a coherent sense of self and to maintain emotional bonds within the family (Fivush Reference Fivush2007; Kulkofsky et al. Reference Kulkofsky, Wang and Koh2009). To this end, parents and children focus on creating a shared subjective perspective, reminiscing about their inner worlds, their thoughts, and their feelings. And in families where parents engage in more emotionally elaborated reminiscing with their children, the children develop a more coherent sense of self (Bird & Reese Reference Bird and Reese2006), higher levels of emotional regulation (Laible & Song Reference Laible and Song2006), and stronger family bonds (Pratt & Fiese Reference Pratt and Fiese2004). Thus, parent–child reminiscing serves both individual and family identity functions.

Importantly, parent–child reminiscing is culturally variable (Wang Reference Wang, Bauer and Fivush2013). What it means to be a self, to have an identity, and to belong are themselves culturally constructed (Wang Reference Wang2016), and developmentally, parents are helping their children become competent members of their culture through helping them construct their personal past. For example, in Western cultures, parent–child reminiscing focuses on individual autonomy, whereas, in Eastern cultures, it focuses on a communal sense of self. By middle childhood, children in these different cultures are already recalling their personal past in different ways, constructing and presenting different forms of identity (Han et al. Reference Han, Leichtman and Wang1998).

These kinds of cultural differences highlight how personal memory is shaped by larger sociocultural frames (McLean & Syed Reference McLean and Syed2015). Cultures define the shape of a life, the significance of certain events, and the appropriate evaluative frameworks for understanding those experiences (Scherman et al. Reference Scherman, Salgado, Shao and Berntsen2017). Thus, individual identity is situated within a cultural or group identity. As adolescents move out into larger sociocultural worlds, having episodic memories that help define them as members of a group is beneficial. Adolescents who have coherent episodic memories that embed them within religious, ethnic, and/or racial groups show higher levels of identity development and higher levels of meaning and purpose in life (Fivush Reference Fivush, Buitelaar and Zock2013; Hammack Reference Hammack2006). Perhaps more compellingly, adolescents who are unable to embed episodic memories in larger cultural identities show high levels of psychopathology and even suicide (Chandler & Lalonde Reference Chandler and Lalonde1998; Kirmayer et al. Reference Kirmayer, Brass and Tait2000). Clearly, the group identity function of episodic memories is critical.

Understanding that episodic memory serves identity functions fundamentally changes how we understand the epistemic function as being as much related to identity as to truth. Episodic memories are constructed within, and are imbued with, cultural worldviews that privilege certain truths (Bordo Reference Bordo and Nicholson1990; Fivush Reference Fivush2010b). Thus, the sociocultural functions of episodic memories provide a foundation for epistemic claims. Of course, cultural worldviews evolve, and paradoxically, often evolve through negotiating and validating individual memories. We can see evidence of this in changing historical perspectives on “truth” such as individual memories of the civil rights movement in the United States (Hall Reference Hall2005), or the memories recorded for the multiple truth and reconciliation tribunals around the world (Bracken et al. Reference Bracken, Giller and Summerfield1995; Pasupathi et al. Reference Pasupathi, Fivush and Hernandez-Martinez2016; Summerfield Reference Summerfield1997). Epistemic claims are made in sociocultural contexts that negate, contest, silence, or validate those claims (Fivush Reference Fivush2010b). The sociocultural functions of individual and group identity create the contexts within which epistemic claims are evaluated.

These arguments raise the question of how authority emerges to make epistemic claims. M&C argue that the individual with the most detailed episodic content will have epistemic authority, but a sociocultural analysis highlights how authority is negotiated through positioning of one's individual and group identity. M&C raise important questions of how episodic memory is used to assert epistemic truth. I argue for the need to place episodic memories in a sociocultural context that privileges certain truths over others in order to preserve individual and group identity.