Narrating Trauma: On the Impact of Collective Suffering

by Ronald Eyerman, Jeffrey C. Alexander, Elizabeth Butler Breese

Overview

Through case studies that examine historical and contemporary crises across the world, the contributing writers to this volume explore the cultural and social construction of trauma. How do some events get coded as traumatic and others which seem equally painful and dramatic not? Why do culpable groups often escape being categorised as perpetrators? These are just some of the important questions answered in this collection. Some of the cases analysed include Mao's China, the Holocaust, the Katyn Massacre and the Kosovo trauma. Expanding the pioneering cultural approach to trauma, this book will be of interest to scholars and postgraduate students of sociology.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781594518874
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	06/30/2013
Series:	The Yale Cultural Sociology Series
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Ron Eyerman, Jeffrey C. Alexander, Elizabeth Butler Breese

Table of Contents

Preface ix

Introduction: On Social Suffering and Its Cultural Construction Jeffrey C. Alexander Elizabeth Butler Breese xi

Part 1 National Suffering and World War

1 A Fire That Doesn't Burn? The Allied Bombing of Germany and the Cultural Politics of Trauma Volker Heins Andreas Langenohl 3

2 The Cultural Trauma of a Fallen Nation: Japan, 1945 Akiko Hashimoto 27

3 Revolutionary Trauma and Representation of the War: The Case of China in Mao's Era Rui Gao 53

Part 2 Ethnic Suffering and Civil War

4 The Trauma of Kosovo in Serbian National Narratives Ivana Spasic 81

5 Trauma Construction and Moral Restriction: The Ambiguity of the Holocaust for Israel Jeffrey C. Alexander Shai M. Dromi 107

6 The Drama of the Greek Civil War Trauma Nicolas Demertzis 133

7 1974 and Greek Cypriot Identity: The Division of Cyprus as Cultural Trauma Victor Roudometof Miranda Christou 163

Part 3 The Performance of Suffering and Healing

8 Extending Trauma Across Cultural Divides: On Kidnapping and Solidarity in Colombia Carlo Tognato 191

9 Claiming Trauma through Social Performance: The Case of Waiting for Godot Elizabeth Butler Breese 213

10 The Worst Was the Silence: The Unfinished Drama of the Katyn Massacre Dominik Bartmanski Ron Eyerman 237

11 Unassimilable Otherness: The Reworking of Traumas by Refugees in Contemporary South Africa Ari Sitas 267

About the Contributors 293

Editorial Reviews

"The book makes a convincing case that the moral lessons of the last century remain ambiguous and contested."

—Andrew Moravcsik in Foreign Affairs

From the Publisher