230414 Trauma and Resistance in Caribbean Literatures (S) (SoSe 2015)

“[...] their telling their stories is in itself an act of renewal, a celebration of survival, a moment of witness, for both the speakers and the listeners. [...] Let us gather around and listen to them.” (Bell x-xi)

The Caribbean shows a long, complex history of human struggle, violence, and oppression, not only in terms of corrupt politics—e.g. colonization, military occupation, numerous dictatorships—but also in regard to natural catastrophes, crime, and poverty. As a result, the Caribbean has always been characterized by migration; it is in itself a Diaspora and there exists a large Caribbean Diaspora outside of the region. Many writers (past and present, inside and outside of the region) have taken these and other issues as their main impulses to write; to write about the harm, the violence, the oppression, the hardship, the discrimination, and, first and foremost, the human condition in the midst of these dynamics.
In the past decades, the fields of memory and trauma studies have flourished tremendously. The term trauma, as Leigh Gilmore explains, “refers to the self-altering, even self-shattering experience of violence, injury, and harm” (6). Among the questions to be discussed in the course of this seminar are: How can such experiences be articulated? How can and do writers reflect traumatic experiences and how can readers and critics read such narratives? What literary techniques are employed? What ethical problems arise? And equally important, how can we combine seemingly oppositional terms such as trauma and resistance? To quote Julian Wolfreys, the depiction of trauma is a difficult task which is “not so much a matter of mimesis as it is of poiêsis” (136). However difficult, it is a task which many Caribbean writers in the Caribbean its Diaspora have mastered effectively; they have created narratives of trauma, violence, and harm which can nonetheless be read as significant acts of resistance.

This course will cover a selection of works by different Caribbean and Caribbean Diaspora authors. Reading will include novels, life narratives, short stories, critical essays, etc. The focus will be put on close readings and group discussions of these texts. Students can obtain up to 3 credit points and a grade or a Studienleistung. Detailed participation requirements etc. will be announced in the first session.