Trauma and the Memory of Politics

ISBN-13: 9780521534208 / Angielski / Miękka / 2003 / 284 str.

Jenny Edkins

Opis

Jenny Edkins explores how we remember traumatic events such as wars, famines, genocides and terrorism. She argues that remembrance does not have to be nationalistic but can instead challenge the political systems that produced the violence. Using examples from the World Wars, Vietnam, the Holocaust, Kosovo and September 11th, Edkins analyzes the practices of memory rituals through memorials, museums and remembrance ceremonies. This wide-ranging study embraces literature, history, politics and international relations, in an original contribution to the study of memory.

Recenzje

'Power seeks to control memory; to keep it in the realm of politics … In Trauma and the Memory of Politics Edkins explores instances when memory has functioned to challenge the politics of the state. Memory can be harnessed as a form of resistance … The second chapter on the London Cenotaph and the Vietnam Wall is, perhaps, the most compelling of these various explorations of the politics of memory … The sections of Kosovo and 09/11 are also noteworthy. In her discussion of Kosovo Edkins argues cogently for reading humanitarianism as complicit with sovereignty rather than posing a challenge to it. In her analysis of the aftermath of 09/11 Edkins suggests that the state ensured that the space of the political was evacuated. One of the remedies for this (a)voiding of the political is to prevent 'trauma time' from fading from view … [the book] forms a valuable addition to an ever growing body of work on the subject of rememberance.' Year's Work in Critical and Cultural Theory

Spis treści

List of illustrations; Preface; 1. Introduction: trauma, violence and political community; 2. Survivor memories and the diagnosis of trauma: the Great War and Vietnam; 3. War memorials and remembrance: the London Cenotaph and the Vietnam Wall; 4. Concentration camp memorials and museums: Dachau and the US Holocaust Memorial Museum; 5. Testimony and sovereign power after Auschwitz: Holocaust witness and Kosovo refugees; 6. Conclusion: the return of the political - the memory of politics; Bibliography; Index.