Articulation and Mediation of Trauma in the Indigenous Memoir Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia
Keywords:
Trauma, Life writing, Transgenerational trauma, IdentityAbstract
Life narratives as expressions of self and lived experiences play a significant role in negotiating a traumatic past. Articulation of traumatic experience through memories has a therapeutic effect. Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia edited by Anita Heiss is a collection of 52 memoirs written by aboriginal authors which distinctly articulate aboriginal life in Australia. The memoir is investigated as an attempt at mediation of trauma. The anthology institutes a correlation between the individual and the group with collective trauma as the point of reference. The concept of transhistorical trauma is functional in reading these memoirs. Trauma as manifested in aboriginal life is studied with emphasis on the concepts of memory and identity.
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