Decolonizing Trauma Studies: Trauma and Postcolonialism
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Decolonizing Trauma Studies: Trauma and Postcolonialism Edited by Sonya Andermahr Printed Edition of the Special Issue Published in Humanities www.mdpi.com/journal/humanities Sonya Andermahr (Ed.) Decolonizing Trauma Studies: Trauma and Postcolonialism This book is a reprint of the Special Issue that appeared in the online, open access journal, Humanities (ISSN 2076-0787) from 2015 – 2016 (available at: http://www.mdpi.com/journal/humanities/special_issues/TraumaPostcolonialism). Guest Editor Sonya Andermahr University of Northampton UK Editorial Office MDPI AG Klybeckstrasse 64 Basel, Switzerland Publisher Shu-Kun Lin Managing Editor Jie Gu 1. Edition 2016 MDPI • Basel • Beijing • Wuhan • Barcelona ISBN 978-3-03842-195-5 (Hbk) ISBN 978-3-03842-196-2 (PDF) © 2016 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. All articles in this volume are Open Access distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution license (CC BY), which allows users to download, copy and build upon published articles even for commercial purposes, as long as the author and publisher are properly credited, which ensures maximum dissemination and a wider impact of our publications. However, the dissemination and distribution of physical copies of this book as a whole is restricted to MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. III Table of Contents List of Contributors ............................................................................................................... V About the Guest Editor ....................................................................................................... VII Sonya Andermahr “Decolonizing Trauma Studies: Trauma and Postcolonialism”—Introduction Reprinted from: Humanities 2015, 4(4), 500-505 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/4/500 .............................................................................. 1 Irene Visser Decolonizing Trauma Theory: Retrospect and Prospects Reprinted from: Humanities 2015, 4(2), 250-265 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/2/250 .............................................................................. 7 Hamish Dalley The Question of “Solidarity” in Postcolonial Trauma Fiction: Beyond the Recognition Principle Reprinted from: Humanities 2015, 4(3), 369-392 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/3/369 ............................................................................ 24 Beatriz Pérez Zapata Decolonizing Trauma: A Study of Multidirectional Memory in Zadie Smith’s “The Embassy of Cambodia” Reprinted from: Humanities 2015, 4(4), 523-534 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/4/523 ............................................................................ 49 Silvia Pellicer-Ortín A Journey across Multidirectional Connections: Linda Grant’s The Cast Iron Shore Reprinted from: Humanities 2015, 4(4), 535-553 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/4/535 ............................................................................ 61 Justine Seran Australian Aboriginal Memoir and Memory: A Stolen Generations Trauma Narrative Reprinted from: Humanities 2015, 4(4), 661-675 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/4/661 ............................................................................ 80 IV Dolores Herrero Oranges and Sunshine: The Story of a Traumatic Encounter Reprinted from: Humanities 2015, 4(4), 714-725 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/4/714 ............................................................................ 96 Jocelyn Martin Manilaner’s Holocaust Meets Manileños’ Colonisation: Cross-Traumatic Affiliations and Postcolonial Considerations in Trauma Studies Reprinted from: Humanities 2015, 4(4), 818-833 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/4/818 .......................................................................... 108 Silvia Martínez-Falquina Postcolonial Trauma Theory in the Contact Zone: The Strategic Representation of Grief in Edwidge Danticat’s Claire of the Sea Light Reprinted from: Humanities 2015, 4(4), 834-860 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/4/834 .......................................................................... 125 Dovile Budryte Decolonization of Trauma and Memory Politics: Insights from Eastern Europe Reprinted from: Humanities 2016, 5(1), 7 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/5/1/7 .............................................................................. 153 Natalie Clark Shock and Awe: Trauma as the New Colonial Frontier Reprinted from: Humanities 2016, 5(1), 14 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/5/1/14 ............................................................................ 169 Stef Craps, Bryan Cheyette, Alan Gibbs, Sonya Andermahr and Larissa Allwork Decolonizing Trauma Studies Round-Table Discussion Reprinted from: Humanities 2015, 4(4), 905-923 http://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/4/4/905 .......................................................................... 189 V List of Contributors Larissa Allwork: School of History, University of Leicester, University Road, Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK. Sonya Andermahr: School of the Arts, University of Northampton, NN2 6JD, UK; English Division, The School of The Arts, The University of Northampton, Avenue Campus, St. George’s Avenue, Northampton NN2 6JD, UK. Dovile Budryte: School of Liberal Arts, Georgia Gwinnett College, 1000 University Center Lane, Lawrenceville, GA 30043, USA. Bryan Cheyette: Department of English Literature, University of Reading, Whiteknights, Reading RG6 6AA, UK. Natalie Clark: School of Social Work, 2080 West Mall, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC V6T 1T2, Canada. Stef Craps: Department of Literary Studies, Ghent University, Blandijnberg 2, 9000 Gent, Belgium. Hamish Dalley: Department of English, Daemen College, 4380 Main Street, Amherst, NY 14226, USA. Alan Gibbs: School of English, O’Rahilly Building, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland. Dolores Herrero: Department of English and German Philology, Faculty of Arts, University of Zaragoza, Campus Universitario, 50009 Zaragoza, Spain. Jocelyn Martin: Department of English, School of Humanities, Ateneo de Manila University, Katipunan Avenue, Loyola Heights, 1108 Quezon City, Philippines. Silvia Martínez-Falquina: Departamento de Filología Inglesa y Alemana, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, University of Zaragoza, Calle Pedro Cerbuna 12, 50009 Zaragoza, Spain. Silvia Pellicer-Ortín: Department of English and German Philology, University of Zaragoza, Calle Pedro Cerbuna, 12. 50009 Zaragoza, Spain. Justine Seran: English Literature Department, The University of Edinburgh, 50 George Square, Edinburgh EH8 9JU, UK. Irene Visser: Department of English Language and Culture, Faculty of Arts, University of Groningen, Oude Kijk in 't Jatstraat 26, 9712 EK Groningen, The Netherlands. Beatriz Pérez Zapata: Department of English and German Philology, University of Zaragoza, Calle Pedro Cerbuna 12, 50012 Zaragoza, Spain. VII About the Guest Editor Sonya Andermahr is Reader in English at the University of Northampton, U.K. She has written widely on contemporary women's writing in Britain and the United States. Her publications include Jeanette Winterson (Palgrave 2009), Trauma Narratives and Herstory (with Silvia Pellicer-Ortín; Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), Angela Carter: New Critical Readings (with Lawrence Phillips; Continuum, 2012), and A Glossary of Feminist Theory (with Terry Lovell and Carol Wolkowitz; Edward Arnold, 2000). She is currently completing a book on narratives of maternal loss in contemporary women's writing and guest editing a special issue on Brigid Brophy for Contemporary Women's Writing. 1 “Decolonizing Trauma Studies: Trauma and Postcolonialism”—Introduction Sonya Andermahr Reprinted from Humanities. Cite as: Andermahr, S. “Decolonizing Trauma Studies: Trauma and Postcolonialism”—Introduction. Humanities 2015, 4, 500–505. This Special Issue aims to explore the complex and contested relationship between trauma studies and postcolonial criticism, focusing on the ongoing project to create a decolonized trauma theory that attends to and accounts for the suffering of minority groups and non-Western cultures, broadly defined as cultures beyond Western Europe and North America. The issue builds on the insights of, inter alia, Stef Craps’s book, Postcolonial Witnessing [1], and responds to his challenge to interrogate and move beyond a Eurocentric trauma paradigm. Authors were invited to submit papers on the theorization and representation of any aspect of postcolonial, non-Western and/or minority cultural trauma with a focus predominately, but not exclusively, on literature. The field of trauma studies emerged in the early 1990s as an attempt to construct an ethical response to forms of human suffering and their cultural and artistic representation. Born out of the confluence between deconstructive and psychoanalytic criticism and the study of Holocaust literature, from its outset trauma theory’s mission was to bear witness to traumatic histories in such a way as to attend to the suffering of the other. Indeed, in a famous formulation, Caruth went so far as to suggest that ‘trauma itself may provide the very link between cultures’ ([2], p. 11). Yet, while trauma theory has undoubtedly yielded numerous insights into the relationship between psychic suffering and cultural representation, postcolonial critics have been arguing for some time that trauma theory has not fulfilled its promise of cross-cultural ethical engagement. Rather than forging relationships of empathy and solidarity with non-Western others, a narrowly Western canon of trauma literature has in effect emerged, one which privileges the suffering of white Europeans, and neglects the specificity