향토민요는 전승되는 과정에서 적층성과 유동성을 동반한다. 이 과정에서 향유자와 전승자의 기억이 매개되며, 기억의 기능에 따라 소리의 변이가 발생하고, 시대와 매체에 따라 소리의 기능이 달라진다. 민요의 사회적 역할은 담당층의 기억이론으로 접근할 수 있는데, 이 글에서는 민요의 문화융합으로서의 발전 가능성을 아리랑을 중심으로 먼저 살펴보았다. 아리랑은 시대마다, 그리고 소리의 주체에 따라 ‘기억하기’를 되풀이해오면서 개인기억이 집단기억화되기도 하고 집단기억으로서의 아리랑이 개인기억화되기도 하였다. 특히 집단기억으로서의 아리랑은 집단기억하기, 집단기억 만들기, 재구된 집단기억 등으로 다양하게 집단화된다. 한편, 기억의 융합은 곧 과거의 융합을 현재에서 행동하는 것이다. 행동은 깊은 과거의 의식 속에 거의 무의식적, 잠재적으로 저장되어 있는 순수기억을 선별적으로 불러내서 이것을 현실적으로 활동시키는 것이다. 그래서 기억 융합은 곧 문화융합으로 이어진다. 아리랑의 문화융합을 위한 방안의 하나로, 습관적 기억화(과거의 현재화)와 기억의 심상화 과정을 설정해보았다. 그리고 이 과정은 다시 기억 중심으로 보면, ‘기억하기단계’－‘기억만들기단계’－‘기억융합단계’로 나눌 수 있다. 그리고 각 단계별로 문화융합방안을 살펴보았는데, ‘기억하기단계’에서는 박물관건립 혹은 기록화 사업을 대표적 사례로 살펴보았고, ‘기억만들기단계’에서는 아리랑축제나 경연대회를, ‘기억융합단계’에서는 예술융합을 대표적 사례로 삼아 논의하였다.

Until now, I have researched the way of Arirang consilience with the memorial culture and memorial consilience. At first, I studied about the function and the essentials of Arirang in the point of individual memory, and then I insisted that Arirang be needed as individual culture at first because Arirang is not a local or national song but a personal folk song intuitively. There are four types of changes of Arirang. First, it has changed from individual memory to collective memory. Secondly, it was originally collective memory. Thirdly, it became collective memory artificially. Lastly, it was reconstituted from forgotten memory. And I have researched the successive changing process of Arirang as a song of loss, resistance & overcome, and as culture as of now. In this process, I found that Arirang has changed from individual memory to collective memory. Also the sympathy and change of medium significantly affected the process. On the other side, Arirang has changed from collective memory to individual memory by the contact of genre, interference, and brokenness of genre's frame by the group experience. Also I suggested that in order to create new Arirang culture as cultural consilience we need the memorial consilience. Also the preconditions for the memorial consilience include functional memory, individual memory, stratification of memory, motive of memory, reinforcement of medium, caution for selection of knowledge, consumption patterns, etc. For the memorial consilience, habit-memory(past as present) and imagination of memory(past as future) are needed. And there are three stages for cultural consilience-the stage of remembering, making the memory, and memorial consilience. Typical examples of remember stage is building a museum or recording documents. Arirang festival or contest is related with the second stage-making the memory, and the best example of the third stage-memorial consilience is art consilience. At present Arirang includes not only songs but also culture-poems, movies, plays, items for daily use. Arirang has become a global song that people around the world enjoy and should preserve and transmit. For this reason, fieldwork and study of the Arirang must be restarted basically. Self-activity is also required for creating new Arirang culture. Local governments should preserve and transmit their local Arirang respectively but should not argue that their own local Arirang should represent the whole Arirang. Otherwise, Arirang culture cannot be in harmony, losing the function of social unification.

korean folk song, Arirang, individual memory, collective(group) memory, art memory, vital memory, memorial consilience, cultural consilience.