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Title Tracing Cultural Trauma: A Study of Selected Kashmiri Fictional Narratives

Author(s) KINZA MASOOD

Abstract Cultural Trauma is a socially mediated process that occurs when a group of people endures horrific events affecting their group consciousness and identity. Cultural sociologists believe that events are not intrinsically traumatic, rather it is the representation of horrendous events by carrier groups that shapes the perception of audience and determines which events qualify as Cultural Trauma. This concept of Cultural Trauma was introduced and discussed in detail by Jeffrey C. Alexander, Ron Eyerman, and various other cultural sociologists in their collaboratively authored seminal book Cultural Trauma and Collective Identity (2004). Using Jeffrey C. Alexander’s theoretical lens which underscores the necessity of highlighting the terrifying injuries of the most defenseless segments of the world’s population i.e. non-Western regions, this research examines the selected fictional narratives by Kashmiri writers, The Half Mother (2014) by Shahnaz Bashir and Lost in Terror (2016) by Nayeema Mahjoor. Through textual analysis, the study foregrounds how these fictional narratives grapple for meaning to demonstrate the permeating impact of Kashmir’s incessant sufferings and contribute to its construction as Cultural Trauma. Moreover, tracing the trauma process in the context of the occupied Kashmir, this study shows how authors of the selected narratives, as cultural agents, craft traumatizing social reality of Kashmir into trauma claims, and determines if it qualifies to be constructed as a Cultural Trauma. Also, analysis of the selected narratives helps to investigate various possibilities and identify constraints embedded in the mediation of such cultural trauma narratives in different institutional arenas which are working under the direct or indirect influence of stratificational hierarchies in Kashmir. This study concludes that Cultural Trauma has not been fully established for Kashmiris because trauma claims are subdued by the oppressors. The illegitimate control of the Indian state machinery in Kashmir subjugates the victims, whitewashes the evils done by perpetrators, and confounds the world by deliberately keeping the real contours of Kashmir conflict hidden from the world at large. By problematizing the necessity of establishing Cultural Trauma for Kashmiris, this study illuminates a crucial social responsibility and political action to be taken by perpetrators of trauma and a wider audience which can only be materialized after successfully establishing Cultural Trauma of Kashmiris.

Type Thesis/Dissertation MS

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Department English

Language English

Publication Date 2022-06-14

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