Interdisciplinary Handbook of Trauma and Culture

Yochai Ataria • David Gurevitz Haviva Pedaya • Yuval Neria Editors

Interdisciplinary Handbook of Trauma and Culture Editors Yochai Ataria David Gurevitz Department of Neurobiology The Interdisciplinary Center Herzelia Weizmann Institute of Science Herzelia, Rehovot , Israel Yuval Neria Haviva Pedaya Medical Department of the History of Israel Center and the New York State Ben Gurion University Psychiatric Institute Beer-Sheva, Israel New York , NY , USA

ISBN 978-3-319-29402-5 ISBN 978-3-319-29404-9 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-29404-9

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016939236

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifi cally the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfi lms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specifi c statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made.

Printed on acid-free paper

This Springer imprint is published by Springer Nature The registered company is Springer International Publishing AG Switzerland To Adi, who is my home in the chaotic darkness, my citadel in a strange and alienated world. Yochai

To my beloved children Matan and Yuval. For Rachel, with Love. David

To all those who shared with me their wanderings. To Yochai. Haviva

I am grateful to my wife Mariana, and my children Michal, Oren, and Maya. Without the love and strength you have given me, my scientifi c work was not possible. Yuval

Acknowle dgements

The editors are grateful to Mikael Rubin for his exhaustive editorial work, and to Peter James and Ari Lev Plat for their editorial assistance.

vii

Contents

Introduction ...... xv

Part I Representations of Trauma

1 Literature as Trauma: The Postmodern Option-Franz Kafka and Cormac Mccarthy ...... 3 David Gurevitz 2 Cultural Trauma and the Media...... 27 Allen Meek 3 Television: A Traumatic Culture ...... 39 Dan Arav 4 Popular Trauma Culture: The Pain of Others Between Holocaust Tropes and Kitsch-Sentimental Melodrama ...... 51 Anne Rothe 5 The Trauma of Modernism: Between Existential Indeterminacy and Allegoresis ...... 67 Dennis Sobolev 6 Before Recognition: On the Aesthetics of Aftermath ...... 87 Lisa Saltzman 7 From Hiroshima to Fukushima: Comics and Animation as Subversive Agents of Memory in Japan ...... 101 Ory Bartal 8 Performative Recollection: Koizumi Meiro Representations of Kamikaze Pilots and the Trauma of the Asia-Pacific War in Japan ...... 117 Ayelet Zohar 9 Architecture and Trauma ...... 133 Teresa Stoppani 10 Art as the Transport-Station of Trauma ...... 151 Bracha Lichtenberg Ettinger

ix x Contents

Part II Theory of Trauma

11 The Trauma of Philosophy ...... 163 Frank Seeburger 12 Irresponsible Nonsense: An Epistemological and Ethical Critique of Postmodern Trauma Theory ...... 181 Anne Rothe 13 The Death of the Witness in the Era of Testimony: Primo Levi and Georges Perec ...... 195 Yochai Ataria 14 Walking, Walking Out, and Walking Through: Transitional Space and Traumatic Time...... 217 Haviva Pedaya 15 Trauma and Monotheism: Sigmund Freud’s Moses and Monotheism and the Possibility of Writing a Traumatic History of Religion ...... 251 Koji Yamashiro 16 The Crisis of Manhood ...... 267 Yochai Ataria 17 Laius Complex and Shocks of Maternality: With Franz Kafka and Sylvia Plath ...... 279 Bracha Lichtenberg Ettinger 18 Fear, Trauma, and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Clinical, Neurobiological, and Cultural Perspectives ...... 303 Mikael Rubin , Maya Neria , and Yuval Neria

Part III Case Studies of Collective Trauma

19 Some Reflections on Transmitting the Memory of and its Implications, Particularly in Israel ...... 317 Saul Friedländer 20 Placing Collective Trauma Within Its Social Context: The Case of 9/11 Attacks ...... 325 Emily Joyner , Katharine Reiner van der Hoorn , Ari Platt , Mikael Rubin , Erel Shvil , and Yuval Neria 21 Masculinity, Spirituality, and Male Wartime Sexual Trauma...... 339 R. Ruard Ganzevoort and Srdjan Sremac 22 Killing the Killer: Rampage and Gun Rights as a Syndrome...... 353 Kirby Farrell Contents xi

23 Loss, Traumatic Bereavement, and Mourning Culture: The Israel Example ...... 365 Eliezer Witztum , Ruth Malkinson , and Simon Shimshon Rubin 24 Fear and Silence in Burma and Indonesia: Comparing Two National Tragedies and Two Individual Outcomes of Trauma ...... 377 Robert Lemelson and Seinenu M. Thein-Lemelson Conclusion: Trauma and Culture: How Trauma Can Shape the Human Mind ...... 393 Yuval Neria and Yochai Ataria

Index ...... 397

Contributors

Dan Arav , Ph.D. School of Media Studies , The College of Management Academic Studies (COMAS) , Rishon LeZion , Israel Yochai Ataria , Ph.D. Department of Neurobiology , Weizmann Institute of Science , Rehovot , Israel Ory Bartal , Ph.D. Department of History and Theory , Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design , , Israel Bracha Lichtenberg Ettinger , Ph.D. Marcel Duchamp Chair and Professor of Psychoanalysis and Art, European Graduate School (EGS) , Saas-Fee , Switzerland Kirby Farrell , Ph.D. Department of English , University of Massachusetts , Amherst , MA , USA Saul Friedländer , Ph.D. Chair in Holocaust Studies, History Department , UCLA , Los Angeles , CA , USA R. Ruard Ganzevoort , Ph.D. Amsterdam Centre for the Study of Lived Religion, Faculty of Theology , Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam , Amsterdam , The Netherlands David Gurevitz , Ph.D. The Interdisciplinary Center , Herzelia , Israel Katharine Reiner van der Hoorn , M.A. Columbia University Medical Center and the New York State Psychiatric Institute , New York , NY , USA Emily Joyner , M.A. Columbia University Medical Center and the New York State Psychiatric Institute, New York , NY , USA Robert Lemelson , Ph.D. Department of Anthropology , University of California , Los Angeles , CA , USA UCLA Semel Institute of Neuroscience , Los Angeles , CA , USA Foundation for Psychocultural Research , Pacifi c Palisades , CA , USA Ruth Malkinson , Ph.D. International Center for the Study of Loss, Bereavement and Human Resilience , , Haifa , Israel Allen Meek , Ph.D. School of English and Media Studies , Massey University , Palmerston North , New Zealand

xiii xiv Contributors

Maya Neria , B.A. Middlebury College , Middlebury , VT , USA Yuval Neria , Ph.D. Columbia University Medical Center and the New York State Psychiatric Institute , New York , NY , USA Haviva Pedaya , Ph.D. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Department, Elyachar Center for Sephardi Heritage, Ben-Gurion University , Beer-Sheva , Israel Ari Platt , B.A. Columbia University Medical Center and the New York State Psychiatric Institute , New York , NY , USA Anne Rothe , Ph.D. Department of Classical and Modern Languages , Literatures, and Cultures, Wayne State University , Detroit , MI , USA Mikael Rubin , M.A. Psychology Department , University of Texas at Austin , Austin , TX , USA Simon Shimshon Rubin , Ph.D. International Center for the Study of Loss, Bereavement and Human Resilience , University of Haifa , Haifa , Israel Lisa Saltzman , Ph.D. Professor and Chair of History of Art and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Chair in the Humanities, Bryn Mawr College, Bryn Mawr , PA , USA Frank Seeburger , Ph.D. Department of Philosophy , University of Denver , Longmont , CO , USA Erel Shvil , Ph.D. Columbia University Medical Center and the New York State Psychiatric Institute , New York , NY , USA Dennis Sobolev , Ph.D. Department of Hebrew and Comparative Literature, University of Haifa , Haifa , Israel Srdjan Sremac , Ph.D. Amsterdam Centre for the Study of Lived Religion, Faculty of Theology , Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam , Amsterdam , The Netherlands Teresa Stoppani , M.Arch., Ph.D. School of Art Architecture and Design, Leeds Beckett University, Broadcasting Place , Leeds , UK Seinenu M. Thein-Lemelson , Ph.D. Institute of Personality and Social Research (IPSR) , University of California , Berkeley , USA Eliezer Witztum , M.D. Division of , Faculty of Health Sciences , Ben-Gurion University of the Negev , Be’er Sheva , Israel Koji Yamashiro Faculty of Humanities , Hebrew University of Jerusalem , Jerusalem , Israel Ayelet Zohar , Ph.D. Art History Department , , Tel Aviv , Israel Introduction

Yochai Ataria, David Gure vitz, Haviva Pedaya, and Yuval Neria

Previous scholars who discussed the evolution of mental trauma as a research fi eld identifi ed its origin as related to the nineteenth-century railway accident (e.g., Farrell 1998; Leys 2000; Luckhurst 2008). They connected trauma with modernity, since one of the most important characteristics of the modern age has been railway transportation (Thacker 2003). Seltzer (1997), for instance, suggested that the “modern subject has become inseparable from categories of shock and trauma” (p. 18). Essentially, such scholars defi ned mental trauma not merely as a by-product of the industrial era but rather went a step further, suggesting that if railways are indeed the icon of modernity then mental trauma stands at the very core of this era, as a constitutive phenome- non that has shaped the structure of its cultural discourse. The association between trauma and culture, however, has much deeper and long-standing roots. The stories of Cain and Abel, the Binding of Isaac, the Binding of Ishmael (after his laughter), and the Crucifi xion of Jesus can all be viewed as traumatic events that stand at the core of the monotheistic culture. In this sense, trauma itself lies at the heart of Western culture. Bearing this in mind, this book seeks to remap and expand the relationship between trauma and culture. When attempting to describe the multifaceted relations between trauma and culture two questions seem to lie at the core of such an effort: First, in what ways traumatic events are represented in specifi c cultures? and second, in what ways collective traumas may shape the structure of culture? The current volume has three parts. The fi rst part is focused on represena- tions of trauma in culture. The second and the third parts of the book focus on the different ways collective trauma may shape the structure of cultures. While the second part of the book attempts to discuss theoretical aspects of trauma-indcued cultural changes, the third part presents a number of case studies of collective trauma. In the fi rst part, Geurvitz (Chap. 1 ) examines the relationship between trauma and literature, illustrated by an analysis of the works of Franz Kafka and Cormac McCarthy. The following three chapters discuss various associa- tions between trauma and the media. First, Meek (Chap. 2) describes the development of cultural trauma as a concept over the past 100 years and how this idea came to be linked with visual media. Arav (Chap. 3) then seeks to shed light on the moving image in general, and television in particular, as a major factor in the establishment of the contemporary culture of trauma. Lastly, Rothe (Chap. 4) argues that melodrama is the dominant narrative

xv xvi Introduction mode for representing experiences of victimization and suffering, discussing how kitsch and sentimentality are encoded at the paradigmatic mode of reception. In the fi fth chapter, Sobolev examines the relationships between modernism, literature, and trauma; this essay stresses the uniqueness of Hopkins’ of trauma and emphasizes the existence of a shared hermeneutic repertoire for dealing with trauma. Further, Saltzman, in the sixth chapter, explores the unique relations between trauma and representa- tion by attending to a set of cultural works including architectural, artistic, and literary—all inspired by the tragic events of 9/11 2001. The seventh and the eighth chapters both deal with representations of World War II in Japanese culture: while Bartal (Chap. 7) examines how the memory of the nuclear holocaust is treated in Japanese comics and animation, Zohar (Chap. 8 ) explores the kamikaze projects of Koizumi Meiro and the manner in which he portrays the trauma of the perpetrator in Japan. The fi nal two chapters of the fi rst part focus on artistic topics: Stoppani (Chap. 9 ) aims to explore the trauma of architecture and Ettinger (Chap. 10 ) seeks to defi ne art as a transport- station of trauma and, in so doing, characterize artistic work in terms of processing and representing trauma. The second part of the book explores theories of trauma and culture more broadly. In the fi rst chapter, Seeburger (Chap. 1 1 ) argues that philosophy is forced to confront what can be viewed as its own defi ning trauma. From such a perspective, the very history of philosophy can be told as a tale of trauma. Following this, Rothe (Chap. 12) critiques the trauma theory presented by scholars such as Ruth Leys, Wulf Kansteiner and Harald Weilnböck. In par- ticular Rothe analyses the transformation of the concept of trauma from sig- nifying the psychological aftereffects of extreme violence into a metaphor for a stipulated postmodern crisis of signifi cation. As such, it argues that trauma theory is both nonsensical and irresponsible. In the next chapter ( 13 ) Ataria examines the notion of bearing witness through a comparison of two Jewish writers: the Italian Holocaust survivor Primo Levi and the French novelist Georges Perec. The next two chapters examine the relationship between trauma and Monotheism. Pedaya (Chap. 14) analyzes the act of walking as a basic reaction to trauma and adversity. The projection of trauma in exploring space is examined through its manifestation in Jewish time perception, par- ticularly the Messianic concept of time and its progression as developed by the Kabbalists—born out of the Spanish Expulsion. The strong affi nities between walking as dispersion and collecting, with its internal identity con- struction, illuminate the modern conceptions of both Benjamin and Freud. Following this, Yamashiro (Chap. 15 ) discusses one of the most important questions regarding monotheistic religions: can we rewrite the birth, develop- ment, and death of the monotheistic religions as traumatic history? This chap- ter represents a starting point for such an attempt. Ataria (Chap. 16 ) then seeks to examine the notion of manhood following the Vietnam War, present- ing what can be considered to be the trauma of the white man in the USA. Ettinger (Chap. 17 ) conceptualizes the Laius Complex , articulating and offering a critique of the paternal subject’s (the analyst’s) desire to scarify the son—based upon an impulse that can reach a degree of Laius delirium — which is projected on the analyzed (“son”) in a psychotic countertransfer- Introduction xvii

ence. Lastly Rubin, Neria, and Neria (Chap. 18) explore the complex relationships between trauma and fear, examining how they intertwine in the context of their most relevant psychopathology—posttraumatic stress disor- der (PTSD). The third part of the book presents a number of case studies of collective trauma. Friedländer (Chap. 19 ) critically discusses key cultural patterns by which Israelis process memories of the Holocaust. Joyner, Neria, and col- leagues (Chap. 20) examine sociocultural aspects of the emotional responses to the 9/11 2001 attacks. Following this, Ruard and Sremac (Chap. 21 ) exam- ine the unique relationships between male wartime sexual trauma, masculin- ity, and posttraumatic spirituality. Farrell, in the fourth chapter ( 22 ), examines the Sandy Hook school rampage in Newton Connecticut and the radical fi re- arms advocacy that followed, which can be viewed in the context of traumatic aftermath. In the following chapter ( 23 ), Witztum, Malkinson, and Rubin address conceptual issues regarding traumatic bereavement and culture in Israel. Lastly, in the fi nal chapter ( 24 ), Seinenu Thein-Lemelson and Robert Lemelson explore the relationship between the personal experience of trauma and larger cultural and political processes that can shape individual outcomes through an examination of two historic national tragedies in Southeast Asia: one in Burma and the other in Indonesia.

References

1. Farrell, K. (1998). Post-traumatic culture. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. 2. Leys, R. (2000). Trauma: A genealogy. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. 3. Luckhurst, R. (2008). The trauma question. London: Routledge. 4. Seltzer, M. (1997). Wound culture: Trauma in the pathological public sphere. October, 80 , 3–26. 5. Thacker, A. (2003). Moving through modernity: Space and geography in modernism. Oxford: Manchester University Press.