Annotated Bibliography
- “Traumatic Awakenings (Freud, Lacan, and the Ethics of Memory).” Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative, and History, by Cathy Caruth, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, pp. 91–112.
Caruth explores Lacan’s interruption of Freud’s theory on trauma suggesting that there is a correlation in surviving a traumatic event and building one’s identity and reality around the event. This chapter is useful in analyzing how survivors or victims shape their lives around traumatic events.
- Balaev, Michelle. “Trends in Literary Trauma Theory.” Mosaic: An Interdisciplinary Critical Journal, vol. 41, no. 2, 2008, pp. 149–166. JSTOR, jstor.org/stable/44029500.
Balaev addresses the concept of trauma as one traditionally associated with memory, experience and language but also adds geographical place to the mix. The formation of identity post traumatic event is linked to the geographical place because of its specific social values. Citing Caruth, Balaev also argues the contagious nature of trauma (intergenerational trauma) on individuals and groups of people.
- Brooks Bouson , J. “Quiet as It’s Kept: Shame and Trauma in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye.’” Scenes of Shame: Psychoanalysis, Shame and Writing, by Joseph Adamson and Hilary Anne Clark, State University of New York Press, 1999, pp. 207–236.
As the title suggests, Bouson explores shame and self-loathing in The Bluest Eye that stems from societal expectations and norms of beauty in a white dominated nation. This “shame” is culturally learned and continually perpetuated throughout generations becoming a part of black identity in the United States. This article is useful in explaining the historical and cultural significance of the Breedloves believing they are ugly as well as the black community deeming them ugly. The article sheds light on racially traumatized groups of individuals and the silence that often accompanies this trauma.
- Ramírez, M. L. (2013). “The Theme of the Shattered Self in Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye And A Mercy”.Miscelánea, 48, 75-91. Retrieved from https://search-proquest-com.proxy.wexler.hunter.cuny.edu/docview/1497043922?accountid=27495
Ramirez analyzes the character of Pecola in the Bluest Eye and argues that she forms her traumatized disassociated identity from a marginalized position that can be attributed to western patriarchal society. Ramirez also makes the connection between a marginalized group of people and the abuse that community inflicts to its own members forming a chain of abuse.
- Vickroy, L. (1996). “The politics of abuse: The traumatized child in Toni Morrison and Marguerite Duras”.Mosaic, 29(2), 91. Retrieved from https://search.proquest.com/docview/1300043843?accountid=27495
Vickroy explores how colonization affected the mindset of people who were subjects of a white ruling class and how it continues to do so. She also analyzes how social powerlessness plays a role in the abuse of children by adults, in particular powerless men. This essay shows how the internalization of dominate beliefs and values create powerless individuals who in turn express their frustration and anger on the most vulnerable members.
This entry is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.
