Traumatic effects and identity formation Testimonials from select texts of holocaust and Slavery

Abstract

This dissertation endeavours to verify and establish the presence and existence of trauma in certain select texts that deal with the sufferings of the German holocaust victims and the victims of racial suppression in America. Dana Amir, the psychoanalyst from Israel, has newlineformulated certain theoretical parameters for analysing the subject s capability for witnessing newlinethe traumatic situation. Based on this, she has sketched out the idea of four modes of newlinewitnessing. Thus with the help of this, an attempt to study the effects on the first generation, newlineand later, of the second generation, to adapt to the cultural and psychological trauma that newlineinevitably triggers the emergence and formation of a new identity in the existing social newlinestructure will also be analysed. newlineThe first phase of the research, will study the texts Night by Elie Wiesel and Invisible Man by newlineRalph Ellison. In this phase, the narrative structure is examined based on the metaphoric and newlinemetonymic modes of witnessing, which further aids in assessing the effects of trauma on the newlinesubject as a result of direct torture. newlineThe second phase deals with the concept of transgenerational trauma and the subject s newlinewitnessing capability based on Amir s theory of excessive mode of witnessing. The broader newlineconcept of cultural trauma and its contribution in framing the identity of the subjects is newlinetackled in the final phase. newlineThe grounds of torture and suffering dealt with in these texts vary across race, culture, gender newlineand contexts. Even then there exists a common factor that overlies these differences. These newlinetraumatic memories spotted in the subjects are traced from a shared heritage of cruelty and newlineoppression from an authority of power. A close reading of these texts helps one in delineating newlinethe suffering of the victims. A glimpse at the legacy of torture in the aftermath of the newlineestablishment of power reveals, even to an empathizing mind, an idea of the immensity of the hardships undergone by these subjects. newlineTrauma studies are a fertile hunting ground for the new generation..