This article is a brief Introduction to a series of articles issued from the Journée Claude Bernard, organized at the Académie Nationale de Médecine. This session had for thematic "Memory and traumatism" and was composed of presentations coming from different disciplines including biological sciences and humanities. Several publications come from the Programme 13-Novembre, devoted to a traumatic event in French society - the attacks of 13 November 2015 in Paris and its immediate suburbs - and its consequences on the construction of individual and collective memories of this tragic event.