Given that I have been suffering from a severe chest infection and a fever for the past week, I hereby decided to talk about suffering, since it is on my mind and I have been thinking about it.
It has been a few weeks since I finished the book Zeitoun and I must say some of the aspects still haunt me till this very day. The book mentions a few horrifying things: the floating dead man, how Zeitoun, the main character treated his infected foot and the discovery of the dead dogs.
The floating dead man appears after hurricane Katrina has struck, and the scene revolves around the canoe passing it and Zeitoun noticing a glistening figure under the sun. Given that this happened in real life, we could only imagine how the character felt when he saw a dead body. It also signifies the level of tragedy that was brought on by this natural disaster, and how life threatening it was for Zeitoun.
I imagine that he must have found himself in a very special position, being able to survive the hurricane must have felt like a blessing; but that was soon taken away from him after the arrest.
Throughout the process of being processed in the badly conditioned jail, Zeitoun mentions the little metal object that got stuck in the sole of his foot, which caused a severe infection that had to be treated right away. He received no medical attention and had to perform a minor surgery on himself by using shards of a broken tabasco bottle to cut inside the wound. That was just nasty and disgusting altogether, considering how inhuman the treatments people received were. There were also mentions of torture in the book, the excessive use of pepper spray by the military and an insufficient supply of food. It was absolutely heart breaking to read about how all of this slowly broke a man, and what it took to break a man such as Zeitoun, who was tough and strong, but ended up living through much more trauma than he deserved in one lifetime.
The last horrific mention was Zeitoun’s discovery of the dead dogs. It isn’t stated directly in the book, but the description of the foul smell is enough to make the readers understand what happened. Although there was an earlier mention of dead puppies in the book, the dogs that were fed by Zeitoun symbolize much more since they embody a certain level of sentiment given and received by Zeitoun, who fed them every single day. Zeitoun was proud of saving the dogs and he was proud of being able to keep them alive. Their death stands out as a metaphor which expresses that a little part of Zeitoun has died after the arrest, and the cruel, heart breaking reality that all promises made were broke, and how nobody tried to help out the poor, suffering animals. It is also an equivalent of how the general population of that area was treated, that received insufficient care and were neglected by the government and rescue crew in so many ways, unable to survive and eventually died off. Similar to the dogs, these were the poor poor souls that suffered the consequences of the hazardous hurricane Katrina.

In today’s blog, I have decided to focus on a very specific theme: trauma, with respect to Zeitoun, and our daily lives. I have chosen this theme because while reading the book, it struct me very deeply that the characters almost seemed to be made up, and that there is no way that this novel serves its purpose as a documentary and memoir to a family that actually exists. The story seemed almost surreal, not because it was strange, or misleading, but because just like Obasan, and the poems of Guantanamo, and Persepolis, and Safe area Gorazde, it was something almost unbelievable, and far away from what our generation is familiar with.
In the novel Zeitoun, we see clear outlines of the dates and times, pictures of the family and letters and emails that were written to the military. It reminded me of a journal, a personal notebook that someone keeps which contains the highlights of their life. Through each line, I was able to feel the characters’ frustration, sadness, disbelief, desperation, and the love between family members. Through each page, I was able to witness what happened, and how it happened. Through further research, I was able to acknowledge the consequences this tragedy has brought upon the Zeitouns, and many other families. This takes us back to my point: the whole of the book serves to illustrate a happening in real life and the suffering of real people. The fact that it is based upon a true story is truly frightening in a sense that we, as privileged as we are, will never be able to understand the pain that these people endured.
Trauma is relevant. It is relevant because to a lot of people, it is something engraved in their life in such a way that they will never be able to wipe it out completely. Whether it comes from a collective incident, or individual situation that led to a series of unfortunate events and feelings, it is there. It is there and we need to acknowledge it. The reason that literature which focuses on trauma is so important is because it paints a picture of reality for us to understand, to see and read about how extremely close to us these incidents really are. The people that have suffered might be your neighbor, your friend, or even someone from your family. Furthermore, different types and variations of trauma exist outside of these pieces too. No matter how big or how small, trauma is integrated in our lives so deeply that there is no way around it. Looking at all the global consequences that we are suffering, and all the individuals that write about their traumatic experiences, It is up to us as a global community, to reduce trauma, and help the globe heal.

As Robert Frost once said: “Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found its words.” and the poems written by captives in Guantanamo bay and Juliana Spahr definitely capture the deep thought of sorrow shared amongst a group of people. This leads us back to the mention of collective suffering, and Butler’s argument that suggested a significant “us” and “them” in the process of mourning.
Contrasting the two poetry books, on one hand we have prisoners, people who symbolize, or who are classified as being evil, or committing some sort of crime. While of the other, we have the desperate outcries and facts of what happened during the horrible incident of 911. All the poems are sad, they mourn in a different way but for the same loss, the loss of having to part with their loved ones, and the loss of freedom. In a sense, all of the people mentioned in the two works are suffering from being “caged”, either in a literal or physical sense. Unable to connect with the outer world and completely shutting themselves out. In addition, there really is no “us” and “them” with regard to suffering, since it cannot be measured and is felt is roughly a very similar way. Butler’s article talks about how these incidents may drive us further apart, and in real life, we are the people that decide whether we deicide to close off from the entire community or not.
In Spahr’s poem that is written right after 911, she takes an approach not necessarily specific towards the people that suffered due to the attack, but stating how all of us divide from cells, how all of us breathe in the space between our hands. She talks of unity, rather than accusation. As for poems of Guantanamo bay, we see the subtle gentleness in between the lines of the people that were accused of committing crimes. I believe that both poetry books strive to overcome the inflicted sense of separation between individual entity and society, going beyond the events themselves, and focusing more on the thought that is conveyed miraculously through the lines of poems.

During this week’s lectures, we discussed Judith Butler’s article Frames of war, digging deep into its correlations with the works that we are focusing on this semester. In this particular blog post, I would like to focus solely on Butler’s mention of “global responsibility” (36).

As global citizens, it is expected of us to question the establishment of our society and how we are affected by different aspects that either encourage or discourage internationality. Butler poses the question “what are the implicit frames of recognizability in play which I recognize someone as ‘like’ me?” (36) The very things that define our identity and thus create a clear cut line between cultures of different kinds. Basis such as theses allow us to become a part of a larger community in which we feel a sense of belonging, yet also aids in the construction of a definite image of ‘us’ and ‘them’.

Regarding collective events such as terrorist attacks or war, we are often forced to choose sides since political situations aren’t easily manipulated. Butler mentions “when a population appears as a direct threat to my life, they do not appear as ‘lives’ but as a threat to life” (42). Initially, these are the incidents in which global citizenship is undermined greatly and is unable to function. Huge traumatic events such as 9/11 raise a strong sense of patriotism within the hearts of a nation and thus distances itself from the rest of the global world. People become caught up in the immense pain and grief, refusing to commute or exchange interactions with other nations.

Essentially, it is not the country that initiated the attack, but they themselves that become their own obstacles. If we were to look at the issue from a global lens, then our focus wouldn’t be directed only towards the Americans that died on 9/11, but also the people that lost their lives while at war with America. We would not blindly set a target on the people we consider ‘enemies’ but consider how the issue can be resolved for the benefit of every single nation, in turn becoming true global citizens and protecting internationality.

When I first flipped through the pages of Obasan, I didnt know how much the story would move me, nor how close we would be able to get to primary sources left by Joy Kogawa herself. Our visit to the Joy Kogawa Fonds deeply impressed me. Looking through old letters, government documents, church postcards and hand written drafts brought the story to life, and we were able to experience how real it really was.

Old documents that were left behind could be traced back as clues appearing throughout the whole story, and the importance of the theme “silence” reappears in old letters and scribbles that indicate how personal this story was for Joy Kogawa herself. “Having been once rendered voiceless, the time is long past for speech to examine the roots and source of our imagination.” (Draft 8-2) Joy writes about the unspeakable trauma that tore her family apart. “My flesh that we like, I will not believe. Till then, I am neither silent, nor do I speak.”(Draft 8-1) A lot of the things found in the archive are not seen in the book, but still represent technologies of memories that serve as important evidence of how the Japanese-Canadian people were mistreated, and how they felt.

Among our findings, one in particular stood out to me. Me and Marie discovered a very small diagram of a family tree, and underneath it were the names of all the characters in the book, and the year\place they were born. A lot of the names were different than the characters in the book, which pose the question “what was Obasan’s real name?” Aunt Emily was written down as aunt Miriam, which could have been the original name, or the intended false name that Joy Kogawa decided to use. It is interesting because all of these minor pieces make up the stream of thought that the writer had during the creation of the book. As it was explained to all of us, the Joy Kogawa Fonds are organized in the exact order as they have been sent in. The papers, documents all add up to a bigger picture, revealing the process of creation and most important of all, what the writer was thinking throughout the process.

Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis is a graphic novel that tells the story of revolution in Iran from the perspective of a young child. The brutal and violent scenes combined with the innocence of the young character ‘Marji’ leave a strong impression to all who read it due to the cruelty of its reality and also the strong emotions that the author herself presents.

In the introduction, Satrapi specifically states that “one can forgive but one should never forget.” (Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi, Introduction) indicating that this piece of work is indeed very personal and emotional, and although her goal was to portray the image of how Iran was, she also wanted the readers to understand how the people in Iran felt. The level of trauma that these people, including herself have experienced is extremely high, and unforgettable. Persepolis therefore not only takes us back to the actual events that happened, but also shows us the actual emotions that were present, which in term is more valuable than simply understanding the context of the revolution, knowing how the people have suffered raises a higher level of consciousness, allowing us to create an emotional linkage between ourselves and our understanding of what has happened.

In Persepolis, Marji’s uncle Anoosh tells her “Our family memory must not be lost.” (Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi, Page 60) because it is very important to remember. The more traumatic it is, the harder it is for people to forget, and the series of incidents that Marji, and all the other Iranians have been through makes up who they are, which in fact becomes a part of their history that they cannot erase. Therefore, remembering is important because it is a part of identity. And by remembering, people are able to understand themselves better. The shocking events that occurred suggest that Marji (and all the others) had to find a way to honor and cope with the loss of loved ones, friends and neighbors, and remembering(not forgetting) acts as a medium to complete this task. By remembering, they are able to “reunite” with all the people they have lost, including a part of themselves, and try to move on with their lives while bearing the past in mind.

Persepolis is a story told from the perspective of a young girl, and follows her perception of Iran during the Islamic revolution. “Marji” tells her childhood tale through the black and white graphic memoir, allowing the readers to have a visual understanding of how life was in Iran during that specific time, and all the hardships that she and her family had to endure.

The memoir expresses violence of the events that occurred in two ways: the actual violence that “Marji” witnessed, such as the meeting against fundamentalism that she attended(Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis, page. 76), and the violence that she imagined happening to the prisoners and soldiers which she heard mostly from her family members.(eg. Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis, page. 51 “burning prisoners with an iron”)

The graphic violence presented not only shows the actual movements that were happening in Iran, but also the constant tension and fear that people, especially children had to endure and live with during that time. “Persepolis” being told from the perspective of a child makes the story even more disturbing, and is able to make the reader reflect on different social issues. The contrast between the innocence of “Marji” and the horrific violence portraits the picture of a child that had no choice but to grow up very quickly, which is very different from what we have experience during our childhood years, yet something that Iranian people from her generation can relate to.

Through the presentation of individual memory, “Persepolis” explores the traumatic experience that Iranian people suffered and expresses collective memory by stating different violent events, for example burning down the Rex cinema (Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis, page. 14-15) and handing out golden keys to exploit young soldiers (Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis, page. 101-102). These events of mass violence state the historical truth of how innocent people were used and what children of that time were exposed to. The narrator “Marji” does not understand the events fully due to her young age, and is not able to cope nor find an explanation of why they were happening, drawing the readers to sympathize. Marjane is able to present her traumatic memory to the world by creating this memoir, and stating her point that “one can forgive but never forget.” (Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis, Introduction) Making “Persepolis” a valuable resource to understanding Iran during times of revolution.

“Third cultural kids”is referring to children who were raised outside of their parents’ culture for a significant part of their development years. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_culture_kid) Due to a lack of historical and cultural roots, tcks are able to construct their own unique cultural memories based on individual experiences and the combination of different perspectives in the places they grew up in.

The exposure to different cultures leads to a lack of cultural identity, which results in a contradictory sense of where “home” might be, creating a non-bias appreciation towards both the country of origin and the adoptive country. According to Jan Assmann, cultural memory is ‘the faculty that allows us to build a narrative picture of the past and through this process develop an image and an identity for ourselves.’(http://www.iea.usp.br/en/news/cultural-memory-the-link-between-past-present-and-future) However in the case of tcks, there is more than one narrative picture which allows them to unify different memories from the past and to form their own individual cultural memories based on the acknowledgments of growing up in foreign countries. Tcks are able to construct their own cultures, which in turn leads to a construction of individual cultural memory, different for each and every tck. The cultural memory constructed is a mixture of the country of origin’s and adoptive country’s culture, differentiating the perception of tcks on the world from other crowds. A tck will always associate cultural memory with more than one country, which gives birth to a new sense of collective cultural memory, where tcks as an “ethnic group” are able to affirm their identities based on similarities that occur during the process of remembering, and in this case, “creating” cultural memory.

In conclusion, the unique construction of a tck’s cultural memory allows them to fully understand their past consisting different cultures, and how it affected their perception and perspective in the present day. On a larger scale, tcks’s are able to find “home” within the cultural memory created that suits each and every tck individual’s character. They have constructed a community and a nation with its own past, that has its own historical value and also its own memories.

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