This article is an attempt to specify the city gate as an important element in the collective memory of the modern city and to follow the "memorial roots" of the gate. In old cities, gates act as thresholds of transition between inner core of the city and the peripheral sectors.Showing common memories and city events, these places have confronted to modernization, population increase, industrial development, etc. By destroying the old walls in the modern city, gates have collapsed, but their place has always reflected memories. This fact could be an advantage for improving the city legibility and supporting people by improving the civil identity that encourages their local and civic pride. This article concentrates on the three aspects of gates: semantic, historical and functional aspect. Gates and their environment are places, which belong to public and the main purpose of their renovation would be to regenerate this feeling that one could be an active member of a society and have many souvenirs of his city's past. For this approach by reviewing the process of gate's evolutions, finding the memorial roots of the old city gates are practicable. As our case study has been conducted in Shiraz, we can consider the memorial roots of the old city gates in seven periods. These periods are Al-e-Buye (eight gates), Atabakan (nine gates), Safavide (nine gates), Zandieh (six gates), Quajar (six gates & three Kals), Pahlavi and contemporary period.In Shiraz of early 1930s changes have rapidly occurred. Since the gate nodes relay the new and old fabric of cities in a mutual connection, the revitalization of these nodal points has an important impact on the memorial framework.Accordingly, We can consider three different categories for the city gates memorial roots; formal, formal- conceptual, and conceptual-memorial. In their formal life period, gates are usually used as defensive and economical elements. Their place and name might be changed through this period of their life. In formal-mental period of the gates' life, accompanied by physical and historical ruptures, their name has changed into urbanistic and technical terms such as square, intersection, etc. Finally, and as an ultimate stage, in the mental-memorial period, gates have substantially changed; there are no more gates visible in the city but it is a common memory that has remained. Nevertheless, the important point is the effectiveness of the concept of old gates in the emergence of collective memories. This article first explores the city gate and its environs as a particular symbolic place in the city structure. Thereupon by reviewing the historic evolution of old city gates in Shiraz and the origins of people's collective memory, we can make a deduction in which we verify the importance of the concept of threshold and territory in the existence of the old urban fabric and its relation with the new one. As a final result, one can deduce that the relationship between the olden and the new urban fabric could be reestablished by maintaining the continuity of the memorial roots and reinforcing the sense of place.

War Memoir writing movement is regarded as one of the broadest cultural events after the Islamic Revolution in Iran. The book "Dä" is one of the best samples in this field. It containsSeyyedeh Zahra Hosseini’s - the narrator- memoirs from the early days of people’s resistance against the occupation of Khorramshahr by Iraq’s invading army, compiled by the narrator herself.Techniques and elements of classic novels such as characterization, description, flashback, dialog, and narration used in this book distinguish it from other diaries to the extent that some critics regards it as a novel.The present study briefly discusses the common aspects and the differences of story and memoir, and examines story elements in "Dä".After comparing these two genres with "Dä", it wasconcluded that although many narrative elements are employed in this book, the presence of some of the basic characteristics of memoir writing has caused "Dä" to be placed among diaries.

Life writing is the most common historical-literary trend in Persian writings in the contemporary period. The history of these writings in Iran is more than one and a half century and they are still increasing in number and variety. Persian life writing as a general genre consists of the different writings. All of the writings contain a realistic account of the life of Iranians. Life writing includes “ single memoir” , “ memoir” , “ autobiography” and “ personal essays” . The study focused on the “ memoir” . Memoir is a type of personal writing that describes human life in writing, about only the most prominent part of his/her life and experiences. Memoirs are often written by celebrities, politicians, militaries, and those whose jobs are very effective. In memoirs, the order of time and continuity of events are observed, and their success usually has an emotional and personal theme. The similarities between memoirs and autobiographies are such that even in the West, their distinctions are not properly recognized and observed. While skilled critics and writers note that in an autobiography, the author is the target, in the memoir, the goal is not the author himself, but the event/events of his life. Compared to autobiography, the social role of memoirs is more prominent. So the memoirist intends primarily to depict a specific event, period, group, or class. Hence, most memoir writers have a socio-historical character. This article was written after considering more than 800 lives. A large number of books were found that have common features in terms of structure and subject matter. This article is dedicated to recognizing, introducing and describing the outstanding features of this type with appropriate examples of it.

According to the definitions of experts, the place of written memoirs is among the primary and important news sources in historiography. The historical study of the formation process and its development in the history of Iran is proof of this claim. This research is an analytical approach and methodological approach about the relationship between memoir and reality and a convincing answer to the question of the validity of memoirs in the form of "autobiography" to what extent is valid for use in historiographical research. One of the results of this research is the verification of narrations of memoir texts based on other documentary sources as well as validation based on the pattern of "frequency of narration" about an event. In addition, based on the immeasurable sides of these memoirs, such as the difficulty of perspective and the unique position of the narrator in the narrative, in the second approach, these memoirs can be considered as works for identifying their narrators as influential people in historical events.