After reading and discussing the novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close book by Jonathan Safran Foer in my ASTU class, I thought a lot about the different biases that people experience trauma through.
This book is about a young boy who loses his father traumatically in 9/11. Half the book is written from the perspective of this boy Oskar. The way he experiences and conveys this trauma to us is extremely different to the way one of the many other millions of people that have been affected by this event. His perspective even differs so much from his own families, as does everyone’s perspectives differ from each other. There are so many ways to tell the stories of trauma, and different ways to experience it too.
An excellent example of a different perspective is when Oskar says “A few weeks after the worst day, I started writing lots of letters. I don’t know why, but it was one of the only things that made my boots lighter” (Foer, 11). Firstly he say the “worst day” and is referencing the traumatic day of 9/11. Secondly, he says that writing letters making his boots lighter, referencing his happiness. labels like “the worst day” and phrases like “make my boots lighter” and expressive of how Oskar interoperates and experiences his trauma. It’s not just Oskar that sees this trauma in a very different way, it’s everyone.
No one is going to have the exact same perspective looking at a traumatic event, or any event for that matter. each person is going to experience the event with their own biases. This is not a bad thing, but it does make me question which parts of the trauma’s stories are being heard? Which biases are we listening and learning through? And who is not being heard?
I hope to look more into these questions by exploring different perspectives on trauma in my ASTU class