Contemporary Canadian and Indigenous Childhood Trauma Narratives
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Western University Scholarship@Western Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository 5-8-2013 12:00 AM Storied Truths: Contemporary Canadian and Indigenous Childhood Trauma Narratives Michelle Coupal The University of Western Ontario Supervisor Manina Jones The University of Western Ontario Graduate Program in English A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the degree in Doctor of Philosophy © Michelle Coupal 2013 Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd Part of the Literature in English, North America Commons, and the Literature in English, North America, Ethnic and Cultural Minority Commons Recommended Citation Coupal, Michelle, "Storied Truths: Contemporary Canadian and Indigenous Childhood Trauma Narratives" (2013). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 1274. https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/1274 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship@Western. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository by an authorized administrator of Scholarship@Western. For more information, please contact [email protected]. STORIED TRUTHS: CONTEMPORARY CANADIAN AND INDIGENOUS CHILDHOOD TRAUMA NARRATIVES (Thesis format: Monograph) by Michelle Coupal Graduate Program in English A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy The School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies Western University London, Ontario, Canada © Michelle Coupal 2013 Abstract This dissertation reconceptualizes generic distinctions between fiction and testimony in accounts of childhood trauma. Scholars such as Leigh Gilmore have argued that while writers of trauma stories are burdened by legalistic definitions of evidence and anxieties about truth-telling, they nonetheless push at the limits of autobiography, often scuffing the border between fact and fiction, in their effort to bring their traumatic stories into language. There has not, however, been a sustained effort to understand and legitimize the place of fiction in testimony, particularly in cases of adult narrations of recovered memories of childhood traumas. My research addresses this lacuna by querying the dynamic relationship between fiction and testimony in both autobiographical and fictional accounts of childhood trauma. This work is motivated by my desire to open up a scripto-therapeutic space for trauma survivors to incorporate stories and use their imaginations to narrate traumatic truths rather than strictly evidentiary truths. In Chapter Two of my dissertation, I explore Sylvia Fraser’s My Father’s House (1987), a pioneering memoir of recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse. I consider this controversial work as a case history of testimony caught between fact and fiction. Chapter Three extends my discussion of the controversy over the truth-status of Fraser’s traumatic memoir to an analysis of the ways in which three Canadian novels similarly challenge conventional boundaries of genre and representation in their fictional articulation of recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse: Ann-Marie MacDonald’s Fall on Your Knees (1996), Shani Mootoo’s Cereus Blooms at Night (1996), and Gail Anderson-Dargatz’s The Cure for Death by Lightning (1996). In Chapter Four, I argue that Indigenous writers specifically employ fiction and storytelling as forms of testimony outside of sanctioned Western discursive arenas such as courtrooms and the media. This chapter explores three residential school narratives: Vera Manuel’s play, Strength of Indian Women (1998), and two novels, James Bartleman’s As Long as the Rivers Flow (2011) and Robert Arthur Alexie’s Porcupines and China Dolls (2002). ii Keywords Contemporary Canadian literature; Indigenous literatures in Canada; life writing; residential school narratives; child sexual abuse; trauma theory; theories of memory; Sylvia Fraser; Ann-Marie MacDonald; Shani Mootoo; Gail Anderson-Dargatz; Vera Manuel; James Bartleman; Robert Arthur Alexie iii Acknowledgments I am deeply grateful to my supervisor, Manina Jones, for her tireless support of me through every stage of the Ph.D.. Thanks, Manina, for your commitment to my project, your brilliant critique of my work, and your wise professional guidance. I am also grateful to my co- supervisor, Joel Faflak, for his astute suggestions, dazzling commentary, and compassionate approach to my subject. Manina and Joel—you have been a dream team. Thank you. I want to thank Sylvia Fraser for generously agreeing to talk to me about her life and work. Sylvia—thank you for your unflinching courage, your grace under fire, and your commitment to telling your harrowing story. I am also grateful to you for your comments about my work. Thanks to my thesis examining committee—Jo-Ann Episkenew, Nandi Bhatia, Julia Emberley, and Kim Verwaayen—for reading my work and for their invaluable comments and suggestions. I am deeply grateful to Deanna Reder. Deanna—without my asking, you mentored me throughout my Ph.D.. Thanks for your intellectual and professional guidance. I was lucky enough to be Joe Zezulka’s Teaching Assistant for two courses in Canadian literature. Thanks, Joe, for everything you taught me about Canadian literature and literary history. I appreciate your collegiality and our many lively discussions. Thanks to all of my CALA colleagues for their community and support. I am especially grateful to Joseph Gold and Hoi Cheu for their mentorship. I am grateful to Mandy Bragg, Candace Brunette, Naomi Mishibinijima, Kelly Nicholas, and all of my students for making Indigenous Services my home over the last three years. Chi Meegwetch Mandy, Candace, Naomi, Kelly, Shelby, Genevieve, Shyra, Xnia, Janie, Stephanie, Lana, Ursula, Adrean, Zeeta, Kylie, Erica, Dakota, Kyrie, Jasmine, Jaela, Kara, Alyssa, Hailey, Cassie, Sara, Elena, and Gord. Thanks to Allison Hargreaves, Elan Paulson, Karis Shearer, and Patti Luedecke for their many years of friendship. iv My thanks to Liz Effinger for her companionship, robust intellect, and riotous sense of humour. Thank you to my life-long friends for their love and friendship: Abby Nakhaie, Alessandra Prioreschi, Tracey Hare Connell, Monika McKinley, Mark Willms, and Jamie Roberts. I could not have finished this dissertation without the support of my father. Thanks, Dad, for believing in me and for your unconditional love. Thanks to the love of my life, my son, for his intelligence, sensitivity, and droll humour. I love you, Max. v Dedication For the children, For the adult survivors, For my mother and her brother— I remember. vi Table of Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................... ii Acknowledgments.............................................................................................................. iv Dedication .......................................................................................................................... vi Table of Contents .............................................................................................................. vii Chapter 1 ............................................................................................................................. 1 1 Narrative Matters: Talking and Not Talking About Child Sexual Abuse ...................... 1 1.1 Overview ................................................................................................................. 1 1.2 A Brief History of Talking About Incest and Child Sexual Abuse ........................ 7 1.3 Talking About Child Sexual Abuse in Residential Schools ................................. 15 1.4 Child Sexual Abuse and the Issue of “Critical Embarrassment” .......................... 20 1.5 Fiction and Testimony: Which Story Do You Prefer? .......................................... 24 Chapter 2 ........................................................................................................................... 29 2 Fiction, Testimony, and Child Sexual Abuse: The Case of Sylvia Fraser’s My Father’s House ........................................................................................................................... 29 2.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................... 29 2.2 Genre, Recovered Memory, and Truth ................................................................. 34 2.3 How Could She Forget? MPD, Adaptive Forgetting, Repression, and Dissociation ............................................................................................................................... 43 2.3.1 MPD .......................................................................................................... 43 2.3.2 Adaptive Forgetting .................................................................................. 47 2.3.3 Repression versus Dissociation................................................................. 48 2.4 Pandora: Encountering Fraser’s Other Self ......................................................... 51 2.5 Holocaust Memories Versus Child Sexual Abuse Memories ............................... 57 2.6 The Recovered Memory Debate ........................................................................... 60 2.6.1 Freud and Janet: The Fathers of the Memory Debate ............................... 60 vii 2.6.2 False Memory Syndrome .........................................................................