FORCED MIGRATION AND REFUGEE CRISIS IN A

LAND OF PERMANENT GOODBYES BY ATIA ABAWI

&WELCOME TO NOWHERE BY ELIZABETH LAIRD

By

Ali Haider
Roll #: 7345

Supervised By
Dr.GhulamMurtaza

Master of Philosophy
in
English Literature
at
Riphah International University,
Faisalabad Campus, Faisalabad (Pakistan)

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 Table of Contents
CHAPTER 1.................................................................................................................1

INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................1

1.1 Thesis Statement..................................................................................................2

1.2 Clarifying the Terminological Boundaries..........................................................2

1.3 Significance of the Study.....................................................................................4

1.4 Delimitation of Study...........................................................................................5

1.5 Study Objective....................................................................................................5

1.6 Research Questions..............................................................................................6

CHAPTER 2.................................................................................................................7

LITERATURE REVIEW...........................................................................................7

2.1 Refugees and Migrants........................................................................................7

2.2 Refugee Trauma...................................................................................................7

2.3 Origin of Psychological Trauma..........................................................................8

2.4 The Nature of Traumatic Memory.......................................................................9

2.5 Overcoming Trauma............................................................................................9

2.6 Recovery from Trauma......................................................................................11

2.7 Resilience as a Coping Strategy.........................................................................13

2.8 Children Literature of Atrocity..........................................................................13

CHAPTER 3...............................................................................................................16

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK...........................................................................16

3.1 What is Trauma Theory?...................................................................................16

3.2 Sigmund Freud Psychoanalytical Theory and Trauma......................................16

3.3 Unclaimed Experiences and Cathy Caruth........................................................18

3.4 Testimony and Witnessing of Trauma...............................................................19

3.5 Theory of Historical Trauma.............................................................................24

3.6 Acting out the Trauma.......................................................................................25

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3.7 Working through the Trauma..................27

3.8 Individual and Collective Trauma:.....28

3.9 Recovery from Psychological Trauma 30

3.9.1 Establishing Safety..........................33

3.9.2 Traumatic Retelling.....................33

3.9.3 Reconnecting With Others..........................................................................34

3.10 History of the Trauma in Psychiatry................................................................34

3.11 Pierre Janet and Psychological Processing of Trauma....................................35

3.12 Abram Kardiner and the Beginning of Integration..........................................36

3.13 PTSD................................................................................................................36

3.14 Refugee Trauma...............................................................................................37

3.15 Traumatic Stress in Historical Context............................................................38

3.15.1 Early Refugee Studies...............................................................................39

3.15.2 Later Refugee Studies...............................................................................39

3.16 Clinical Assessment of Refugee Trauma.........................................................40

3.17 Theory of Resilience and Refugee Agency.....................................................40

3.18 Meta Theory of Resilience...............................................................................41

3.19 Resilience in Refugees.....................................................................................42

3.19.1 Decentrality...............................................................................................44

3.19.2 Complexity................................................................................................44

3.19.3 Atypicality.................................................................................................45

3.19.4 Cultural Relativity.....................................................................................45

3.20 Trauma and Children Literature.......................................................................45

3.21 Fairy-Tale Form of Children Trauma Literature.............................................46

3.22 Young Adult Children’s Literature..................................................................47

3.23 Picture Books and Children Trauma................................................................48

3.24 Psychoanalysis, Trauma Theory & the Children’s Literature of Atrocity.......49

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CHAPTER 4...............................................................................................................51

ANALYSIS.................................................................................................................51

4.1 Atia Abawi: An Introduction to the Novelist.....................................................51

4.2 A Land of Permanent Goodbyes: An Overview................................................52

4.3 Tareq’s Trauma and the Elision of Memory......................................................52

4.4 Refugees Trauma...............................................................................................54

4.5 Forced Displacement.........................................................................................55

4.6 Harrowing Journey.............................................................................................58

4.7 Tareq’s Journey to Europe and the Role of Resilience and Agency..................60

4.8 The Arrival in the Host Country........................................................................63

4.9 Alexia as a powerful Character and a Volunteer...............................................64

4.10 Coping Mechanism..........................................................................................64

4.10.1 Establishing safety....................................................................................65

4.10.2 Traumatic Retelling..................................................................................65

4.10.3 Reconnecting with Others.........................................................................66

4.11 Testimony and Witnessing...............................................................................67

4.12 FINAL SETTLEMENT...................................................................................68

CHAPTER 5...............................................................................................................70

WELCOME TO NOWHERE...................................................................................70

5.1 Elizabeth Laird as a Novelist.............................................................................70

5.2 Welcome to Nowhere: a Short Summary..........................................................71

5.3 Children’s Literature of Atrocity and Picture Books.........................................73

5.4 Political Disability, Trauma of War and Terrorism...........................................74

5.5 Political Crisis and Refugee Movements...........................................................76

5.6 Religious Discrimination, Terrorism and Trauma.............................................78

5.7 Trauma of War and Insecurities of Food and livelihood...................................80

5.8 Refugee Migration and Trauma of Place...........................................................81

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 5.9 Bosra a City of Joy and Happiness....................................................................81

5.10 Daraa a City of Chaos......................................................................................82

5.11 Countryside, the Last Connection with Syria..................................................83

5.12 Jordanian Syrian Refugee Camp and Settlement in Transit............................86

5.13 Britain the Promised land.................................................................................88

5.14 Technology, the Road to Resilience or Propaganda........................................89

CHAPTER 6...............................................................................................................94

Conclusion..................................................................................................................94

References...................................................................................................................97

iv
 Abstract
We live in an age where an ever increasing number of people are on the move; where
conflicts and persecutions displace millions from their homes every year, and where
forced displacement is becoming more and more protracted. Therefore, forced
migration and refugee crisis are among the greatest contemporary challenges of the
world today.This research intends to investigate the two novels,A land Of Permanent
Goodbyes by AtiaAbawi,Welcome to Nowhere by ElizabethLaird, for the purpose of
describing the experiences of the characters regarding their displacement, their
journeys, wrought with all kinds of dangers and their arrival upon the respective safe
havens. This research is an endeavor to capture the real metal image of the traumatic
experiences of the refugees through the use of Literary Trauma Theory. Another
purpose of the research is to capture the glimpses of resilience or agency posed by
refugees against the unrelenting structure in their encounter. This research is an
interdisciplinary research and it will draw both upon the theories of LiteraryStudies as
well as on Refugee and Forced Migration Studies.

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CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

From the last few years, there has been a trend in Literary Studies of the
publication of a number of migration based novels. Therefore, an ever-growing
number of contemporary Writers are writing about recently displaced refugees,
displaced due to the war and political conflicts in their respective countries. The
important factor which remains prominent regarding these novels is the fact that all
these novels target young readers as their audience. Among these writers, Benjamin
Zephaniah, Beverley Naidoo, Alan Gratz, Berlie Doherty, Dave Eggers, Elizabeth
Laird etc. are notable. These novelsfocus on the events which cause their characters to
flee from their homeland, some focus on their journey, while others discuss their
arrival in their respective safe heavens. Some others deal with all these three stages
(Arizpe, 2018). By their writings, these authors are promoting the cause of the
greatest contemporary challenges of today’s world, commonly known as the forced
migration and refugee crisis. These writing are also assisting the international
community, particularly the western, to develop an understanding and awareness of
the problems of refugees.

Immigration policies and treatment of immigrants are highly controversial

issues, in most of the western nations today, involving lots of uncertainty and unease.
Refugees and immigrants are being dehumanized and are taken as a potential threat to
the security and economy of the host nations. Questions are continuously being asked
how many refugees should be accepted each year and whether the refugee claimants
are legitimate with their demand of asylum. Media and the political elites are busy to
promote a mentality of “Crisis” regarding refugees and they are being deemed as
“enemies at the gate”(Esses, Medianu, & Lawson, 2013).

Refugees are continuously being tagged in stereotypical and xenophobic

terms. The warfare in the Middle East and revolution following the Arab Spring have
given rise to a turmoil that created a large numbers of displaced persons who found
themselves completely lost in the European lands searching for a place of shelter. This
large number of refugees soon to be reckoned as Crisis, both by the European media

1
and political elites. Part of their agenda is to construct a negative image of the
refugees in front of general community, so that people would associate them with
illegality, terrorism and crime.

Incoming populations are accused of wasting public resources that would

otherwise be granted to the local community. This claim shifts the public attention
towards the illegitimacy of the refugee claimants and towards the question whether
they actually deserve their empathy and support or not. So the new works drawn on
the theme of migration are vital to develop a new discourse to counter the growing
nationalist sentiments and anti-migration stances around the world(Esses et al., 2013).

1.1 Thesis Statement

Fictional portrayal of the harrowing journey of the traumatized Syrian refugee

characters through the use of the trauma theory to demonstrate how the psychological
trauma influences their life after migration and what strategies they adopt to cope with
it.

1.2 Clarifying the Terminological Boundaries

Both Bloch and Dona, in their recently published book Forced Migration:
Current Issues and Debates (2018), quoted another researcher B.S Chimni as:

Forced Migration is a general term that includes both refugees and asylum
seekers and those who are internally displaced by conflicts, famine,
development projects, chemical or nuclear wars or natural and environmental
disasters. As an academic field forced migration studies grew out of refugee
studies, a field that evolved in the 1980s with the changing profile of refugees,
their movement from the south to the north, and the responses of these
northern states that set out to contain refugees in the global south.(Baloch,
2018, p. 42; Chimni, 1998)

While the refugee status of an individual can be defined in term of the 1951
Geneva Convention, which says that, “refugee is who, owing to a well-founded fear
of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a

2
particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his
nationality”(Baloch, 2018, p. 45).

To avoid the hassle of being caught in the maze of the terms like refugee and
migrant, as both of them are usually used interchangeably, it is essential to keep in
mind that refugee is the person who experiences a territorial forced displacement of
the kind in which he finds himself into a new place or culture across border. Another
important factor to be considered here is the principle of non-refoulement, which
states that refugee must accept the status of exile for him and should not return to a
country where he is at risk of persecution. While on the other hand, a migrant can be
anyone who travels from one place to another not by force but according to a plan,
without the restriction of accepting the exile-status. And this would be termed as
voluntary migration, not as forced migration.

Agency is a well-known concept in the field of Refugee and Forced Migration

Studies and Social Sciences.Structure is the opposite term used in comparison to it.
Both the terms can be defined as follows: Agency means to act independently and
make free choices by an individual; by contrast, Structure is those factors of influence
(such as social class, religion, gender, ethnicity, ability, customs, etc.) that determine
or limit an agent and their decisions (Barker, 2003, pp. 233–245). Forced Migrants
use their agency, although limited, and are resilient and active in their decision
making. Mainwaring identifies two sites of migrant agency: resistance based agency
and what she terms as “everyday forms of agency” (Baloch, 2018; Mainwaring,
2016).

Resilience is an important concept associated with the concept of

psychologicaltrauma andfor decades the fields of social sciences as well as humanities
have been collectively focusing over the consequences of stress. At some point in life
many people go through some serious life threatening traumatic experiences that can
result in post traumatic stress disorder. When stress exposure is extremely high, it can
result in the shape of anxiety, depression, burnout and numerous physical conditions.
Yet if there is a concern about the harmful effects of the trauma, there is also an
unparalleled interest in resilience (Southwick, Bonanno, Masten, Panter-Brick, &
Yehuda, 2014) . The American Psychological Associationdefines resilience as ‘‘the

3
process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats or even
significant sources of stress” (Southwick et al., 2014, p. 2).

1.3 Significance of the Study

This research is being undertaken to investigate two Syrian migration based

novels, A Land of Permanent Goodbyes by AtiaAbawi, Welcome to Nowhere by
Elizabeth Laird.

The purpose of the investigation is to find out the effects of forced migration on
refugees’ psyche; that how the traumatic process of forced displacement that involves
war, persecution, violence and loss affects the psyche of the refugees. For this
purpose, a series of concepts and theories have been explored with an aim to examine
the corpus of our novels. Literary Trauma Theory will provide this research one of its
theoretical backgrounds. Some of the other theoretical assumptions of the Refugee
and Forced Migration Studies, would help us explain the cause of three of the most
critical phases of the refugees crisis, like their treacherous journey across the
internationals boarders to flee from the persecutions and regional conflicts, their
arrival to the respective safe havens, which entails different encounters with
unrelenting borders, violent border guards, traffickers and hostile travelers and lastly,
their settlements in camps. Special focus would be given to the analysis of the
Children Characters as both of these novels are mostly written from the perspective
of children.

It has been observed that one of the important strand the literature of
migration deals with is the issue of visibility and the effect (here Testimony and
Witnessing) it has on the refugees as well as on the readers (Arizpe, 2018). It has been
observed that children’s literature that can successfully capture the exact mental and
visual imagery of the refugees’ experiences, increases understanding and empathy
among the young readers (Arizpe, 2018; Arizpe, Bagelman, Devlin, Farrell, &
McAdam, 2014).

The better understanding of the issue will help us to launch a civil action to
protect the rights of the refugees against the ever-rising stern nationalist sentiments of
the natives living in the Global North of the world, where they are seen as unwanted

4
and undeserving (Arizpe, 2018). Apart from this study will help us to record the
testimony and witnessing of the refugees’ trauma, which otherwise would have gone
“unrepresented”.

The second purpose of conducting this research is to record the instances of

resilience (agency) posed by the refugees against the oppressive structure or the
opponent forces. For this purpose study will take help from the Theory of Resilience
in psychology. Besides that some of the other cultural and sociological concepts
regarding the term would also be entertained in the study. This will help us to better
understand the refugees’ behavior in the face of high risk environments.

Lastly, the concept of migrant agency would be used to question the traditional
concepts of sovereignty, security and citizenship. That will help people to get the
better idea of the miserable conditions of the refugees in their native countries, during
their stay in the transit camps and after their resettlement to their respective safe
heavens.

1.4 Delimitation of Study

This study is delimited to gauge the impact of trauma upon the migrants’
psyche and to access that how trauma can affect the cultural and social life of the
refugees. The research also pays special attention to question the traditional concept
of sovereignty, security and citizenship regarding refugees’ migration. Research is
applying the theoretical framework of Literary Trauma Theory and the Theory of
Resilience to get the desired results.

1.5 Study Objective

i- To explore how the trauma is depicted in the selected fictions of migration and
to identify the impact of trauma on the migrants’ mental health in the above
mentioned corpus of novels.
ii- To access the cultural and socialconditions of the refugees in the selected
novels.
iii- To find out how the characters in the selected novels resist their trauma.

5
 iv- To identify how the constraint between the migrants and the opponent forces,
question the traditional concepts of sovereignty, security and citizenship in the
selected novels.

1.6 Research Questions

i- How is refugee trauma depicted and treated in the selected fiction of migration
and how do the traumatic experiences impact their psyche?
ii- What does the refugee trauma, represented in the selected fiction, explain
about the cultural and social conditions of the refugees?
iii- How does the intersection of agency and structure or the constraint between
the migrants and opponent forces, defined in the selected fiction of migration,
question the traditional concepts of sovereignty, security and citizenship?

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CHAPTER 2

LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Refugees and Migrants

Baloch and Dona (2018), refer to the definition ofGeneva Convention 1951
about the refugee that refugee is a person , “Who on account of a well-founded fear
of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a
particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality
and… is unwilling to return to it” (Baloch, 2018, p. 45).

Baloch and Dona (2018) further explain that Forced Migration is a general
term that includes refugees, asylum seekers and internally displaced people.
According to them, as an academic field forced migration studies grew out of refugee
studies, a field that developed in 1980’s with the changing profile of refugees, as most
of them started moving from the Global South to North. In response of these
movements northern states wanted to contain these refugees in their native south.

2.2 Refugee Trauma

Boehnlein and Kinzie (1995) explain that refugee trauma can be described in
many ways. It is a condition which is associated with a large number of displaced
people around the globe. Refugees face acculturative pressure in their newly settled
countries, which include financial and employment stressors, conflict between the
traditional socio-cultural values and those of the host country, alienation and many
more. To study the cross cultural trauma of the refugees, it is imperative to focus on
the social, familial, religious and political background of the affected people.

Boehnlein (1995) explains that the formal study of refugee trauma started with the
published reports of psychosocial adjustment of Jewish refugees. War in Vietnam was
another turning point in the development of the refugee research. Various theoretical
perspectives emerged during these studies. PTSD, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder,
was considered as the best diagnosis method of the time. But the cross-cultural
validity of the PTSD concept, remained a controversy.

7
2.3 Origin of Psychological Trauma

Sigmund Freud is considered as the founder of the concept of trauma. In

Beyond the Pleasure Principle, he introduces his chief ideas of trauma theory, known
as metaphor of the shield: “We describe as ‘traumatic’ any excitations from outside
which are powerful enough to break through the protective shield”(Freud, 1920, p.
23).

In his early works Freud argues that the repressed feelings of earlier sexual
assault cause traumatic hysteria. Freud and Breuer emphasize in Studies in Hysteria
that it is the remembrance of the event that becomes traumatic and not the original
event in itself and the talking cure or abreaction is the solution to understand the
morbid effects of past.Freud (1920) says that there is a membrane in brain which
keeps control of the stimulus, but if a stimulus passes through the membrane, it
directly affects the mind. Freud (1920) relates the word trauma to its literal meaning
of bodily wounds as he explains trauma as a wound on the protective shield. Once the
protective shield against stimuli is broken through it proves to be as insufficient to the
demands of reality.

Michelle Balaev in a book, A Companion To Literary Theory talks with

reference to Freud, that while working on the war neurosis and the problem of
repetition of trauma, Freud proposes that traumatic events “split off” the ego from its
unity by creating conflicts in the ego and these conflicts then repress upon memory
but return later in dreams. This conflict creates traumatic neurosis, which is the result
of breakage of the protective shield (Richter, 2018, p. 362).Balaev further quotes
Freud and says,when “fright” occurs the lack of anxiety causes neurosis. Anxiety
provides defense against traumatic neurosis but sudden fear remains defenseless.
Traumatic neurosis simply means the “compulsion to repeat” the memory of the
painful event because repetition will allow to master the unpleasant event. The
traumatize patient repeats the painful event in his dreams to master the stimulus by
producing the anxiety, the lack of which was causing the traumatic neurosis (Richter,
2018, p. 362). The narrative of the event becomes crucial in this matter. The patient
cannot remember the real event but only reproduce it in his dreams or “unconscious”.
Through talking cure and abreaction patient can develop an understanding about his
past (Richter, 2018, p. 362).

8
2.4 The Nature of Traumatic Memory

Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative and History (1996) by Cathy

Caruth, is an extension of the work of Freud on trauma. Caruth (1996) answers the
questions how traumatic experience influences the human mind and how it resurfaces
in the mind.Caruth (1996) examines the trauma narratives through psychoanalysis and
literary criticism. Caruth(1996) explains that trauma is a deferred experience that
returns to haunt his survivor. She explains her point with reference to the Freudian
concept of latency, a period in which the memory of the traumatic even lost in time
but returns after sometime. The subjects then trap in an involuntary cycle of
repetition, a sort of a reliving of the traumatic experience. For Caruth (1996), this
involuntary repetition occurs because the traumatic experience does not properly
assimilate into the memory initially. Trauma occurs so unexpectedly that it ruptures
the memory and this rupturing experience then returns to the subject in the form of
nightmares and flashbacks.

Caruth (1996) asserts that trauma is enigmatic because “it simultaneously

defies and demands our witness” (Caruth, 1996, p. 5) . Caruth (1996) suggests a
rethinking of trauma with the perspective of history.Caruth now claims that traumatic
experience is trans-historically passed across generational gaps through narrations
both verbal and written. According to Caruth (1996) trauma is a belated experience
that “is fully evident only in connection with another place, and in another time”
(Caruth, 1996, pp. 18–19). For Caruth (1996), history and trauma is never one’s own.
Caruth (1996) claims that trauma is belated experience in relation to the traumatic
history of another subject. So, rather than focusing over the traumatic narrative of an
individual, she encourages us to focus over the collective and historical narrative of
the trauma. She encourages us to turn away from the individualistic pathological
explanation of the trauma to the collective and pluralistic narrative of trauma across
history.

2.5 Overcoming Trauma

Dominick LaCapra'sRepresenting the Holocaust is an important book on the

psychoanalytic concept of trauma. In this book LaCapra elaborates a theory of
historical trauma and its transmission. His theory of trauma deals with three

9
psychoanalytical topics: the return of the repressed; acting out versus working
through; and the dynamics of transference. In order to overcome trauma, the
traumatized person has to pass from two different stages, which in LaCapra’s(2016)
view are “acting out” and “working through”. Acting out means, traumatized
individual is stuck in the past and past continues to haunt him/her in his/her
nightmares or compulsive behavior. Working through simply means that victim is
trying to work his way through the aftereffects of trauma which he/she can’t handle.
In this stage, the victim boldly accepts his/her trauma as a part of his/her life and
because he/she recognizes this trauma as his/her own, he/she can come to term with it
by mourning and finally accepting it.

LaCapra (2016), mentions acting out as action in which the subject relives his
unconscious wishes and phantasies in the presentwith a sensation of
urgency(LaCapra, 2016, p. 208). He defines working through as, “ working through is
undoubtedly a repetition, albeit one modified by interpretation and—for this reason
liable to facilitate the subject’s freeing himself from repetition mechanisms”(LaCapra,
2016, p. 209).

A traumatic historical event according to him tends first to be repressed and

then to return in the form of repetitive compulsion. He is basically concerned with the
return of the opressed in form of discourse. He describes the two possibilities of the
return of the historical trauma as a discourse. These are also the two different ways of
responding to trauma. The one is, “the redemptive, fetishistic narrative that excludes
or marginalizes trauma through a teleological story” (LaCapra, 2016, p. 192).

According to LaCapra (2016) the second response, “ tends to aggravate

intentionally or unintentionally trauma in a largely symptomatic fashion” (LaCapra,
2016, p. 193). He simply wants to work through the trauma that does not “deny the
irreducibility of the loss or the role of paradox or aporia” but avoids of its being
“compulsively fixated”(Berger, 1997). According to him acting out the whole
traumatic event is important because if there would be no acting out or no repetition
of the of the traumatic disruption the resulting account of the historical trauma would
be the same fetishistic narrative that would deny the reality of trauma (Berger, 1997).

10
 His most noticeable concept in Representing the Holocaust: History, Theory,
Trauma is the concept of transference. Transference is actually a failure to come to
term with the discursive return of the trauma. Transference in psychology is about
returning of a past memory. Transference is about acting out the repressed memory in
a new remedial way that makes space for the change or new critical evaluation. It is
the occasion for working through the symptoms of trauma. It provides a way to
understand the symptoms of trauma as one’s own. According to the LaCapra, the
failure to recognize the traumatic event by the German nationalist historians is a
failure to recognize their transferential relation to other objects (Berger, 1997).

2.6 Recovery from Trauma

Judith Herman one of the pioneer in the field of psychology published her
magnum opus workTrauma and Recovery in 1992. The book is hailed as a ground
breaking work for the treatment and recovery of trauma.Herman (2015) discusses, in
the first part of the book, about the history of the treatment of trauma. She says, “To
study psychological trauma means bearing witness to horrible events” (Herman, 2015,
p. 7). In her definition of the trauma Herman asserts that human body and mind
develop trauma when they are restricted to work against it, conditions in which no
escape and no resistance is possible. In this situation the humanself defense becomes
overwhelmed and disorderly(Herman, 2015, p. 34). Traumatic events cause ultimate
changes in cognition, memory and emotion (Herman, 2015, p. 34).

Herman says that a victim of trauma can experience the trauma without its
clear memory. Conversely, he may relate the whole story of trauma without
emotion(Herman, 2015, p. 34). According to Herman, the traumatized people act in
way as their nervous systems have been detached from their present. She further
relates the example of a poet Robert Graves, who recounts that how in his civilian life
he reconnects himself with the trenches of World War I. Judith Herman then goes to
explain the four major symptoms of the post- traumatic stress disorder, which
according to her are “hyper arousal”, “intrusion”, and “constriction”,
“disconnection”(Herman, 2015, p. 35). Hyper arousal, according to the Herman is,
“the human system of self-preservation going into permanent alert, as if danger might
return at any moment.” Explaining further she asserts that hyperarosal is something in

11
which, the traumatized person becomes easily frightened, he sleeps poorly and
becomes quick tempered (Herman, 2015, p. 35).

For discussing “Intrusion”, she asserts that it can happen to the survivor even
long after the actual traumatic event. It is about reliving of the trauma by the
survivors. According to her, this situation further bars the survivors to actively take
part into their normal life.

The third symptom of trauma according to Herman is Constriction, which

means that the survivors of the trauma feel completely powerless in the face of the
Post-traumatic disorder. Their system of self-defense shuts completely. According to
Herman same system of powerlessness can clearly be observed in animals, who
become “freeze” when attacked by someone (Herman, 2015, p. 42). She further
explains that events regarding traumatic incidents are recorded in the memory or
awareness but they still remain disconnected from having any specific meaning. This
leads to numbing of the perception of survivors. Survivors’ perception of time alters ,
giving an impression to the victim that everything is happening in a slow motion and
experience loses its reality (Herman, 2015, p. 45).

In the second part of the book she explains about the stages of the recovery,
which according to her every trauma survivors must go through in order to fully
recover from PTSD. The first stage, According to Herman, of recovery pertains to
survivor’s safety. Herman asserts that without achieving a reasonable degree of
safety, anything regarding therapeutic work would be futile. Establishing safety
begins with controlling the body at first andthen movingoutward towards controlling
the environment.

The second stage pertains to the fact that the survivor of the trauma should
remember the whole story regarding the traumatic event and mourn for it. Here the
victim would be able to narrate his/her story of trauma. The therapist here plays a vital
part as a witness who would help the survivor to speak the unspeakable. Herman says
that by this re-telling of the event survivor tries to reintegrate the traumatic memory
into normal memory of the survivor(Herman, 2002).

12
Third stage belongs to reconnection. By now, the survivor has re-established his lost
trust on others, as they are pretty clear with their vision that to whom they can trust
and to whom they can’t.

2.7 Resilience as a Coping Strategy

According to Richardson (2002), resiliency and resilience theory is based

upon three waves of resiliency inquiry. First wave is about the identification of the
resilient qualities of individuals and it inquires that what Internal and external
qualities are present in individuals who thrive in the face of misfortune contrary to the
persons who don’t. The first wave of resiliency is a shift of perception from looking at
the risk factors involve in the psychosocial problems towards the recognition of an
individual strengths.

According to Richardson (2002), the second wave of resiliency inquiry is an

attempt to find out that how the resilient qualities are developed?This model depicts
that; individuals have a set of protective factors, which are already explained in the
first wave that seeks to stabilize or normalize the situation after some adversity
happens. The term “biopsychospiritual homeostasis” is used to narrate this acquired
state of changed body, mind and spirit.

Richardson (2002) says that the third wave investigates the motivational forces
and emphasis on developing of the experiences that foster the ability to utilize these
forces for self-actualization. Resilience theory points towards the force in everyone
that urges them to seek self- actualization with the use of the spiritual force of inner-
self.

2.8 Children Literature of Atrocity

Kenneth Kidd, in his book Freud in Oz (2011), writes that the serious study of
children’s literature is said to have started with Freud. Freud was interested in genre
now associated with the children’s literature, the fairy tale. Kidd (2011)elaborates that
it would not be wrong to proclaim that psychoanalysis developed in parts through its
engagement with the children’s literature. Psychoanalysis used children’s literature to
materialize its themes and methods, turning first to folklores and fairytales and then to

13
its material development during the analysis of children’s literary texts (Kidd, 2011,
p. vii).

“Subjects previously thought too upsetting for children are now deemed
appropriate and even necessary” (Kidd, 2005, p. 120). Much realistic literature about
the children and adolescents deals with traumatic experiences like divorce, racism,
class struggle, immigration problems, wars, terrorism, natural disasters etc. (Kidd,
2011, p. 182). Kidd calls this type of literature as the Literature of Atrocity.

Since late 1980’s and early 1990’s, children’s text about trauma has grown
rapidly. Despite the difficulty of representing the true nature of the trauma, there
seems to be consensus among researchers that children’s literature of trauma is the
most suitable stage to display the trauma works. And the most appropriate genre has
been the Literature of Atrocity. Older children’s literature has always been about the
management of the trauma while the emotional and psychological side of trauma is
dealt under the banner of trauma of atrocity(Kidd, 2011, p. 182). The children’s
literature of atrocity is the only form which endorses the interactive dynamic of
children’s literature and psychoanalysis; otherwise the children’s literature has always
been resistant to open acknowledgment of trauma (Kidd, 2011, p. 183).

According to the Felman and Laub both psychoanalysis and literature work as
the testimony to the unspeakable, both recognizing the unconscious witnessing of the
subject. So, too, is the function of children’s literature (Kidd, 2011, pp. 183–185). It is
no surprise that contemporary theorists claim literature and psychoanalysis analogous
forms of trauma “testimony”. Children’s literature is both considered as therapeutic
and testimonial (Kidd, 2005, p. 122).

Fairy Tales, according to the kidd (2011), revised the trope of the wounded
child of Freud. The wounded but resilient child of the pop-psychoanalysis enables a
new form of genre known as fairy tale (Kidd, 2011, pp. 186–187). Drawing upon the
works of Freud, Burno Bettelheim famously suggested that fairy tales help children to
cope both with pain and daily psychic troubles.Kidd (2011) then Introduces us with
another form of the children literature of atrocity known as Young Adult Children’s
Literature and emphasis, with reference to another theorist Langer, that Holocaust
narratives should be hopeful and emphasize survival or resilience rather than the

14
works of literature like 1952 English translation of Anne Frank’s journal, The Diary
of a Young Girl, which according to him are marked by an absence of pain and the
muting of the anguish or a neglect of death. Langer, in pursuit of the more realistic
details of the Holocaust narrative, urges the recognition of and respect for the pursuit
of death in the Holocaust narrative. According to him, these works with their little
trace of deathwork or deathwriting, deflect us from tackling the authenticity of
unbearable truths (Kidd, 2011, p. 189).

According to Kidd (2011), Picturebook as a third genre of the children

literature of atrocity is deeply associated with the emotional and imaginative lives of
children (Kidd, 2011, p. 104). Picturebook offers the most dramatic form of testimony
of trauma. Because of its association with early childhood and its visual power, this
form has a great power to shock and to educate. According to Kidd (2011)
Picturebooks are there to equip our children with the political insight and moral
courage to fight against these conditions.

15
CHAPTER 3

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

3.1 What is Trauma Theory?

We are living in an age of trauma. Writing in the London Review of Books,

Thomas Laqueur reports that there is a verifiable increase in the use of the word. Once
it hadbeen an obscure concept but now it is found everywhere.Vocabulary of the
trauma seems omnipresent and all over the place. In everyday language we termed
traumatic events as ranging from casual to most catastrophic. Post-traumatic stress
disorder (PTSD) has become the talk of the town and trauma is increasingly
understood as a severe public health issue. If trauma has become an established
concept in the cultureat large, this is also true in literary studies, where trauma theory
has come to represent a significant critical approach, one that according to Cathy
Caruth “demands a new mode of reading and of listening”(Caruth, 1996; John Roger
Kurtz, 2018, p. 1).

Trauma studies originated in the 1990s and depended on Freudian theory of

psychoanalysis in order to develop a model of trauma which imagines an extreme
experience that challenges the limits of language and the meanings which it conveys.
This model of trauma explains that sufferings cannot be represented. Another model
of trauma quickly follows it, which suggests that unspeakability of the trauma is not a
solitary defining feature of trauma rather it is one among many such responses
required for an extreme event. The initial boundaries of the field is set by the idea that
a traumatic experience tests the limits of language, shatters the psyche, and even
changes the meaning completely and this notion continues to affect the critical
discourse of the field for a long period of time until it recently changed by many
alternative approaches (Richter, 2018, p.360).

3.2 Sigmund Freud Psychoanalytical Theory and Trauma

Freud’s works on traumatic neurosis and memory prove to be the corner stone of the
field. Psychoanalytic theories regarding psychological trauma arose in the 19thcentury.
Freud with his co-workers sets the basis of the field by working on the shell shock and

16
hysteria. Freud’s early theories in Studies on Hysteria written with Joseph Breuer, and
especially his remodeled theories in Beyondthe Pleasure Principle, dominate the field
and are employed by critics extensively even today.

According to Freud traumatic experience can only be understood after a

Latency period, a period in which the memory of trauma becomes diminish but
returns later when set off by some similar event(Richter, 2018, p.361). Freud and
Breuer write:We may reverse the dictum “cessantecausacessateffectus” (when the
cause ceases the effect ceases) and conclude from it that the recollection of the past
traumatic event continues to inflict pain by a directly releasing cause for years.
Hysterics suffermainly from reminiscences. Freud and Breuer study’s (as cited in
Richter, 2018, p.361). According to them the process of remembering inflicts the
psychological pain but also assigns value to an already repressed experience in the
unconscious. They termed this traumatic remembrance as pathogenic reminiscences.

In Freud’s work Beyond the Pleasure Principle, he introduces his central

concept of trauma theory, known as metaphor of the shield: “We describe as
‘traumatic’ any excitations from outside which are powerful enough to break through
the protective shield”(Freud, 1920, p.29). According to him there is a membrane in
brain which keeps control of the stimulus, but if a stimulus passes through the
membrane, it directly affects the mind. Freud relates the word trauma to its literal
meaning of bodily wounds as he explains trauma as a wound on the protective shield.
Once the protective shield against stimuli is broken through it proves to be as
inadequate to the demands of reality. In his Four Fundamental Concepts, Lacan
suggests that the recognition of such inadequacy is central theme of the entire
psychological project(John Roger Kurtz, 2018; Lacan, 1978). According to Freud
trauma causes the ego to split off from its unity. This causes traumatic neurosis, which
means breakage of the protective shield of brain. According to Freud, immediate
encounter with any outside danger causes neurosis because in this situation subject
lacks anxiety. By traumatic neurosis Freud means the “compulsion to repeat” the
memory of a painful event because repetition will allow to master the unpleasant
event. According to him the patient repeats the painful event in his dream. Freud
suggests for the abreaction and talking cure for the victim of the trauma as it will
allow him to gain a better understanding of the traumatic past.

17
 Today trauma theory is popular for its abreactive model of trauma, which
means producing of a “temporal gap” and splitting of self. So, this Freudian concept
of trauma and memory stresses to recreate or abreact the trauma through narrative
recall. But according to the Freud this remembrance of the traumatic event would be
an approximate account of the past as traumatic experience hinders
representation(Balave, 2008). The literary trauma theory articulates this cognitive
chaos as an inherent characteristic of traumatic experience and memory. Literary
trauma theorist explains this pathological division of psyche in the metaphorical
terms. That is the reason Michelle Balaev suggests to use this abreactive model in
literary criticism as the shattering trope(Balave, 2008).

3.3 Unclaimed Experiences and Cathy Caruth

Cathy Caruthin Unclaimed Experienceexplains that trauma is unrepresentable.

She elaborates it by saying, “trauma is not locatable in the simple violent or original
event in an individual's past” (Caruth, 1996).

Traumatic experience is unrepresentable because of the inability of the brain to

properly encode and process the event. The origin of traumatic response remains
unknown forever; yet, the ambivalent, real event remains ever-present.According to
this theory trauma repeats itself in flashbacks which re-enacts the whole event as
mind can’t represent it otherwise. “The historical power of trauma is not just that the
experience repeated after its forgetting, but that it is only in and through its inherent
forgetting that it is first experience at all”(Balave, 2008; Caruth, 1996, p. 17).The
critical emphasis on trauma’s unspeakability explains that extreme experience
destabilizes both language and consciousness(Richter, 2018, p. 363).

Traumatic experience is just like a photographic negative stored in an

unknown place of the brain. It can create interruption in consciousness and it
maintains the ability to be transferred to non-traumatized individuals and groups. In
this concept of trauma, responses are perceived as pathologic in nature and narrative
speaking is considered as the only act of recovery (Balave, 2008).

Caruth's concepts of trauma and memory are considered as an important

source of theorization in literary trauma studies. Both these allied concepts promote

18
the notion of trans-historical trauma. This theory considers trauma as repetitious,
timeless, unspeakable; yet, it is also a real, transferable, and mummified event. Caruth
understands that these external events once enter into the brain of a pure subject can
cause harm. And although these experiences are isolated in brain, it can still infect to
other pure subjects of same ancestry or ethnic origins through the act of narration.
Caruth comes with the suggestion that traumatic experience is contagious or
transferable by stating that “trauma never simply one's own...but precisely the way we
are implicated in each other trauma”(Balave, 2008; Caruth, 1996, p. 24).

Caruth then talks about the “transhistorical trauma”, which means that trauma of any
group in the past can be experience by an individual living centuries apart, because
trauma is considered as timeless, repetitious and pathological in nature. Conversely,
individual’s trauma can be transferred to other members of the same group, who share
the similar social and biological background, so traumatic experience of an individual
subject and whole group becomes one. The reader, listener, or witness all shares the
same trauma firsthand. Therefore, Balave says that historical traumatic experience is
the source of defining individual, racial or cultural identity (Balave, 2008). However,
this theory of intergenerational trauma has its own limitation. One such limitation is
blurring the distinction between the individualloss and historical absence. Personal
loss means lived experience of trauma faced by an individual while the historical
absence means historically documented loss faced by one’s ancestors in history
(Balave, 2008).

Theory establishes a concept of identity, which is organized upon a notion of

the intergenerational sharing of loss and suffering (Balave, 2008). Caruth was
working with a larger Poststructuralist concern, which explains the referential limits
of language and history(Richter, 2018, p. 364).This merging of individual and
collective experiences of trauma, gives rise to some universal effects of trauma upon
identity and memory, especially the fragmentation or dissociation of consciousness.

3.4 Testimony and Witnessing of Trauma

ShoshanaFelman and DoriLaub further expand on the Caruth’s theory and

give rise to some remarkable concepts of testimony and witnessing through their
work. They develop a theory of witnessing working on the Freud methodology of

19
clinical treatment of traumatized subject. They revere the Freud for his
revolutionizing the field by developing the method of psychoanalytical dialogue.
According to them, Freud method is unparalleled in the sense that his
psychoanalytical dialogue provides a way in which the doctor’s testimony never
really replaces the patient’s testimony rather resonates with it, because according to
Freud, “it takes two to witness the unconscious” (Felman & Laub, 1992, p. 15). Then
they follow Caruth’s causality, that any traumatized individual will try to look for a
nonexistent record which is yet to be made (Felman & Laub, 1992, p. 57). The
process of recovering from the traumatic experience becomes a testimony in which
the witness retells their story, but simultaneously experiences it for the first time.

According to the SandorGoodhartTestimony is potentially a very dangerous

book because of its notion of “impossible witness”.According to him Testimony refers
to the silence that commonly associated with the Holocaust survivor's voice, despite
of being the cognizant witness of theHolocast. According to the Laub, this
impossibility of talk arises from the very overpowering nature of the traumatic
experience, which shapes the victim’s experience in a many ways but which has no
substantial form expect of an uncanny repetitious acting out(Goodhart, 1992).

According to the Laub, the Holocaust causes the disappearance of the real
Other, which resulted in a kind of black hole that swallowed up any attempt to enter
or to observe it. As a result trauma related to Holocaust can never really be located as
“no witness” left to observe or register it(Goodhart, 1992). Laub’s point here is not
parallel to any revisionist agenda, that reality doesn’t exists, rather according to the
Laub, it cannot be observed because it occurred only too overbearingly (Goodhart,
1992).

He further explains that we can only witness to those experiences which we

can bear to witness. He says that claiming to be neutral in wake of violence,discredits
that neutrality in the act of proclaiming it. While, to declare to be complicit with
atrocityor its victims is immediately invalidate the cognitive witness, the detached
observation. Nothing is left uncontaminated or untainted (Goodhart, 1992).
ShoshanaFelman adds to this theory in her analysis of the two novels of Camus and of
Paul de Man’s silence about his war time journalism. Her analysis also comprises
over a film of LanzmannShoah.

20
 To answer the question of what is testimony, Horowitz comes up with a
satisfactory answer by defining the term as, “Any form, object or act, serving as
evidence or proof, testimony applies both to the survivors' narratives and the survivors
themselves”(Horowitz, 1992).

In Testimony both the writers consider the Nazi genocide as an event “without
witnessing”(Horowitz, 1992).In Testimony both the writer reconstruct the history,
personal or collective about the Holocaust (Horowitz, 1992). According to the authors
our cultural frames of reference and our already existing categories have failed to
register our present dayhistory(Felman & Laub, 1992, p. (xv)).

Therefore according to the writers, Holocaust testimony is impossible to

produce or absorb. In Felman words Holocaust is “an event without witness”
(Horowitz, 1992). According to her this happens because, survivors in the midst of the
testimony fall short of the words, memory and narrative to explain their experiences
accurately. As asserted by the Primo Levi thatour language is unable or insufficient to
record the destruction of a man (Levi, Woolf, & Roth, 1996, p. 22). This language
constraint come between the survivors and their testimony and this will hinder the
possibility of recording witness. So, the Holocaust remains “an event without
witness”(Horowitz, 1992).

Secondly, as most of the victims of the Holocaust have scattered, so in their

absence others try to speak for them and they can just approximate the real voice. As
Levi notes that, “we, the survivors, are not the true witness”. This lack of availability
of the true witness for testimony establishes a testimony of its own kind , which can
easily be misunderstood and misconceived or neglected(Horowitz, 1992).Loytard
explains the same thing as, Human beings those who were provided with the language
fell into the situation which barred them to tell anything about it. According to him
they are disappeared, and the survivors rarely speak about it. It seems as if the
situation didn’t even exist. Or else it did exist but our informant’s testimony is false.
Because either he or she should have vanished, or they should have chosen to stay
silent….”(Felman & Laub, 1992, p. 3). The death of the victims of the testimony
closes the door to register the testimony of the genocide’s experiences first-hand.

21
 Another valid reason of the fact that Holocaust remains “without witness”, is
the atrocity which unmakes the self, unmakes the world and thus unmakes the
possibility of any solid witness (Horowitz, 1992). In this way, survivor’s writing both
acts as a testimony and non-testimony at the same time (Horowitz, 1992).

Same happens with those who try to hear or read the stories from an outside
world, develop a radical unfamiliarity of the world of the survivors in terms of their
known, familiar world. They try to domesticate the stories of the survivors and in
doing so they diminish the horror associated with these stories, so these stories largely
remain unheard or unread(Horowitz, 1992).

Felman and Laub develop a psychoanalytic model to describe why according

to them the Holocaust as “an event eliminating its own witness”(Felman & Laub,
1992, p.xvii). Within that paradigm, they set out to develop the "crisis of witnessing."
For attaining this purposeboth position themselves as reader/listener, where listening
helps to record the witness.Felman sees Holocaust testimony as the Freudian
“psychoanalytic dialogue”,while Laub constructs an ideal listener, the enabler of the
testimony. Both of these roles finally help to the construction of a historical
memory.Laub depicts his own role as an active listener in the process of recreating
testimony as, “to respect...not to upset, not to trespass… the subtle balance between
what the woman knew and what she did not, or could not, know”(Felman & Laub,
1992; Horowitz, 1992). According to him testimony involves bringing to surface from
"the ruins of memory" something which was never explained before (Horowitz,
1992).

Survivor’s experiences consist over the unconscious memory, which is

brought to conscious to make testimony and it makes the witness for both the survivor
and listener (Horowitz, 1992). Laub discusses the effectiveness of using video
recording in interviews with survivors and makes clear the connection between
individual story, collective story and history. Felman also sees testimony as an
unknown thing, which is enacted in the process of testifying. While Laub focuses on
the individual memory, Felman sees the Holocaust in its totality.She sets the
enactment of testimony in arts and pedagogical practices. Felman says that
Psychoanalytic theory is nothingexcept for a finally available statement, which was
unknown at the start but that was gradually attained through the process of

22
testimony(Felman & Laub, 1992, p. 16). So, testimony is something which is related
to the unconscious, waiting to be revealed both for the speaker as well as for listener
at the moment of re-enactment.

Laubs, in his first article contributed to the volume, explains the relation
between a listener and a patient in the psychodynamics ways. He says, the listener to
the narrative of the human traumas or atrocities has to face a unique situation.
Although, plenty of historical documents are available of the human agony and
torment, he (listener) has finally been able to explore something which is in fact non-
existent; a record that has yet to be made. Thus, narrative recalling gives birth to
cognizance, the knowing of the event.Testimony of trauma, thus, requires a hearer,
who works like a blank screen upon which the traumatic event written (Felman &
Laub, 1992, p. 57).

Laub emphasis over the fact that without a listener or a hearer for the victim’s
narrative, trauma can never be known and testimony can never be witnessed. The role
of the witness is given such a central position in the traumatic testimony of the Laub
that a failure of listening may constitute “a return of the trauma…a re-experiencing of
the event itself”(Felman & Laub, 1992, p. 67; Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 71).

But curious things begin to happen in his second article, when, on account of
many Holocaust testimonies that he has listen to, he comes to a strange conclusion
regarding the Holocaust that during its historical occurrence, it produces no witnesses
what so ever. Acoording to the Laub, it is actually the inherent incomprehensibility or
the complex psychological structure that precludes the Holocaust to bear its own
witness (Felman & Laub, 1992, p. 80). Thus, Holocaust as an event works against a
successful witnessing, which leads to a perpetual trauma for both the individual
victim and for wider collective memory.Laub describes the Holocaust as “an event
without a witness”, which gives rise to a totalizing fear, dehumanization and
dissociation. Nazi project precludes the possibility of witnesses of the mass genocide
that was happening(Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 71).

Thus according to Laub, “The Holocaust created in this way a world in which
one could not bear witness to oneself”(Felman& Laub, 1992, p. 81). Roger Kurtz,
thus explains in his book Trauma and Literature, “The experience and memories of

23
Holocaust survivors appear to resist the possibility of “working through” and
“healing” trauma on both an ethical basis, given the moral imperative not to forget,
and on a psychoanalytical basis, given the unavailability of a witness”(Roger Kurtz,
2018, pp. 72–73). So the “impossible history” that Caruth explains regarding the
survivors of the trauma becomes impossible not only as the inability of the survivors
to narrate their trauma but also impossible as a narrative of the cultural memory
(Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 73).

3.5 Theory of Historical Trauma

Dominick LaCapra'sRepresenting the Holocaust is an important book on the

psychoanalytic concept of trauma. In this book LaCapra elaborates a theory of
historical trauma and its transmission. His theory of trauma deals with three
psychoanalytical topics: the return of the repressed; acting out versus working
through; and the dynamics of transference.

In order to overcome the trauma, the traumatized person has to pass from two
different stages, which in LaCapra’s view are “acting out” and “working through”.
Both these terms are synonymous to the Freud terms “melancholia” and “mourning”
respectively (Berger, 1997).

Acting out means, traumatized individual is stuck in the past and past
continues to haunt him/her in his/her nightmares or compulsive behavior. Working
through simply means that victim is trying to work his way through the aftereffects of
trauma which he/she can’t handle. In this stage, the victim boldly accepts his/her
trauma as a part of his/her life and because he/she recognizes this trauma as his/her
own, he/she can come to term with it by mourning and finally accepting it.

A traumatic historical event according to him tends first to be repressed and

then to return in the form of repetitive compulsion. He is basically concerned with the
retrieving of the suppressed memory in form of discourse, rather than of any physical
return in the form of the genocides. He describes the two symptomatic possibilities of
the return of the historical trauma as a discourse. The one is, “the redemptive,
fetishistic narrative that excludes or marginalizes trauma through a teleological
story”(Berger, 1997; LaCapra, 2016, p. 192).

24
Fetishistic narrative in Eric Santner’s view means, “The construction and deployment
of a narrative consciously or unconsciously designed to expunge the traces of the
trauma or loss that called that narrative into being in the first place” (Friedländer,
1992, p. 144). The narrative fetish is contrasted with a different term of Freud known
as Trauerarbeit or the work of mourning. Both terms are basically the responses to
loss. Mourning is a process of presenting and incorporating traumatic shock by
remembering it; while the narrative fetishism is a refusal to mourn over loss.
Fetishism is a strategy of eliminating the need of mourning, in fantasy (Friedländer,
1992, p. 144). The example of this mode is the work of the German Nationalist
historians, who although not deny the Holocaust but they remove it to the narratives
of German sacrifice and tragedy(Berger, 1997).

Lacparasimply wants to work through the trauma that does not “deny the
irreducibility of the loss or the role of paradox or aporia” but avoids of its being
“compulsively fixated”(Berger, 1997). According to him acting out the whole
traumatic event is important because if there would be no acting out or no repetition
of the of the traumatic disruption the resulting account of the historical trauma would
be the same fetishistic narrative that would deny the reality of trauma (Berger, 1997).

His most noticeable concept in Representing the Holocaustis the concept of

transference. Transference is actually a failure to come to term with the discursive
return of the trauma. Transference in psychology is about retrieving the past
suppressed memory. Transference requires repeating of past event in a way that
makes space for the change or new critical evaluation. It is the occasion for working
through the symptoms of trauma. It provides a way to understand the symptoms of
trauma as one’s own. According to the LaCapra, the failure to recognize the traumatic
event by the German nationalist historians is a failure to recognize their transferential
relation to other objects (Berger, 1997).

3.6 Acting out the Trauma

Traumatic experiences can be acted out in many forms. In most cases

nightmares take the patients back to the places of trauma unconsciously. But patient
can even experience the traumatic event in the form of flash-backs while awaking.
LaCapra himself explains the state of Post-traumatic acting out as, “in which one is

25
haunted or possessed by the past and performatively caught up in the compulsive
repetition of traumatic scene” (Codde, 2010, p. 17; LaCapra, 2001, p. 21). So, the
traumatic nightmares keep on haunting the patient repeatedly several times while
awaking. Patient struggles to make the difference between the reality and the dream
because of the repeated flashbacks of the traumatic event(Codde, 2010, p. 17). Beside
this, acting out also shows itself through compulsive behavior and amnesia, which
means the lack of memory, or sometimes through hypermnesia, the excess of memory
(Codde, 2010, p. 17). It is this lack of memory which victim tries to grasp with a
repetitive remembering.

This obsessive behavior reflects itself in the failure to make thought-

connections or in isolating memories. Failure is reflected in the patient’s urge to
repeat, which replaces the urge to remember. Same happens while witnessing the
major historical traumas where words to describe the whole event fall short (Codde,
2010, p. 17).

The tendency to resist the remembering is obvious with the victims when
memories are too hostile and hurtful to remember. Freud therefore doesn’t
undermines the importance of resistance“The greater the resistance, the more
extensively will acting out (repetition) replace remembering” (Freud et al., 1976, p.
2502). But when patients don’t co-operate with therapist and resist talking, therapist
faces difficulty but it also conveys a lot about the patient condition. Therapist task is
to help the victims of trauma to dig deep into their own memory and face the
repressed memories of the trauma so that the missing pieces of information can be
brought back to the natural metal scheme in order to understand it(Codde, 2010, p.
17).

These memories of the traumatic events are largely inaccessible to the

conscious recall and control, which means, patient is not able to conjure up the
disturbing images of trauma by his own. Therefore, patient always needs the help of
other people in order to cope with these distressing experiences(Codde, 2010, p. 17).
The other major aspect of the acting out process is the distinction between the absence
and loss. Both the terms seemingly implies that something is missing. Absence
doesn’t reflect that there was something to start with, whereas loss does reflect the

26
possession of something. LaCapraexplains that, it is important to help the patients to
understand both the things clearly and distinctively.

3.7 Working through the Trauma

In a progress from acting out to working through, it is essential that a victim

must convey his feelings regarding the trauma to someone else in order to break the
temporal confusion and repetitious cycle of the trauma. This means that one can place
the trauma into one’s memory by changing the traumatic memory into narrative
memory. For this purpose one can create a chronological narrative of his/her
traumatic event, which is narrated in front of an active listener or a therapist, who in
view of the Laub, acts as “the blank screen on which the event comes to be inscribed
for the first time”(Felman& Laub, 1992, p. 57). It is the task of the therapist to make
the unknown repetitive behavior known for the victim so that it would well be
integrated to his memory (Codde, 2010, p. 19).

The important thing to keep in mind here is that it is only through testifying
that the victim becomes witness to the trauma and the listener becomes a secondary
witness to it. But this testimony may incorporate some of the trauma to the listener of
the narrative(Codde, 2010, p. 19). Both Laub and LaCapra are agreed on a point
regarding the listening of the victim’s trauma that there are two methods to listen to
the survivors’account of the traumatic event. When a listener listens to the testimony
of the victim, he shows that he understands both the trauma and problems of the
victim. This reaction of “empathic unsettlement” is a healthy response, which
indicates that the listener doesn’t have a full identification with the victim(Codde,
2010, p. 19).According to Felman and Laub empathic unsettlement can also be
experienced by the reader of the written trauma narrative. They call this type of
narrative the “life testimony, which penetrate us through the text like real life (Felman
& Laub, 1992, p. 2). But if the listener to the narrative takes this association between
him and the victim very far, it becomes very dangerous and trauma really becomes
one’s own, which LaCapra has termed as “vicarious experience”, means a “virtual
experience”, which is opposed to a healthy experience (LaCapra, 2001, p. 47). When
an experience becomes a vicarious one, the listener to the narrative of the victim has
to make sure that he/she clearly identify or differentiate between the absence and the
loss because this difference is something which is already forgotten by the original

27
witness too(Codde, 2010, p. 19). If a listener overly sympathizes with the victim,
there is a valid chance that victim start taking it genuinely as a loss although there was
no loved one initially to take a start with it (Codde, 2010, p. 19). Therefore, the need
is to remain objective as a listener. If the listener mixes absence and loss, there is lees
hope for initial witness. This may develop the maniac agitation in victim that leads to
historical trauma, in which everyone can be possible victim to trauma(LaCapra, 2001,
p. 64).

The listener tries to understand this inherent incomprehensibility on the

victim’s part by allowing the victim to talk about his experiences with intermittent
interruption and motivation while talking.The response of the listener or interviewer
becomes extremely important to the victim during these difficult parts, though it is
also a fact that to give a proper or appropriate response to the traumatic testimonies of
the victim is difficult for the listener as he/she has not experienced it directly (Codde,
2010, p. 20).

At the end when one has effectively worked through the trauma, “one is both
back there and here at the same time, and one is able to distinguish between (not
dichotomize) the two”(LaCapra, 2001, p. 90). Which means the victim can remember
the past and the trauma associated with it and sometimes gets obsessed with it but
without losing the connection with the present. Because now he knows that it is
present which is important and the past is different from the present in the sense that it
is just a healthy part of his and her memory.

3.8 Individual and Collective Trauma:

Kia Erikson, in his ground breaking essay Notes on Trauma and Community,
defines the collective trauma of a community, which according to him is due to the
damaged attachment patterns that sustained a community. According to him the,
“gradual realization that the community no longer exists as an effective source of
support and that an important part of the self has disappeared”(Caruth, 1995, p. 187;
Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 147). Erikson argues that there is always a social dimension to
trauma and trauma can also be the foundation of the community (Caruth, 1995, p.
185). Erikson definition of trauma is not much different from the definition of Caruth
and LaCapra. He defines trauma as, “Trauma is generally taken to mean a blow to the

28
tissues of the body…or of the mind” (Caruth, 1995, p. 183). He also adds that people
who have been traumatized or gone through some kind of trauma often distrust the
world around them and its people. They often remain cautious of the looming
destruction the world can bring for them (Caruth, 1995, p. 184). He also provides the
definition from the classical medical world when he asserts that, “... “trauma” refers
not to the injury inflicted but to the blow that inflicted it, not to the state o f mind that
ensues but to the event that provoked it. The term “post-traumatic stress disorder” (a
peculiar gathering o f syllables, if you listen carefully) is an accommodation to that
medical convention.

According to him the distinction between the clinical and the common world
is now blurring. Erikon’s main focus regarding trauma is on the tissues of the
community’s mind. He says that traumatized communities are different from a group
of traumatized persons. He further explains that tissues of a community can be
damaged much like the same way as the tissues of body and mind. According to him
trauma always has a social dimension (Caruth, 1995, p. 185). He even claims that
trauma of community can work the same way as do the common language and
common background, to impart the feeling of unity.According to Erikson, there is a
difference between the individual and collective trauma. He defines individual trauma
as a blow to the individual’s psyche, which breaks through one’s protective system
quickly without giving one the chance to be settled down. While, according to him,
the collective trauma is a blow to the tissues of social life that destroys the communal
bond between the people(Caruth, 1995, p. 187). According to Caruth there are two
form of community trauma, whether taken alone or in combination, harm to the
tissues of the community that bound the people together and formation of general
feelings, moods and attitude part of the social climate(Caruth, 1995, p. 190).

After that he introduces a term technological disaster, which according to him

“collisions, explosions, breakdowns, collapses, leaks, and of course, crises like the
one at Three Mile Island, are “technological” disasters (Caruth, 1995, p. 191). Then
he differentiates between the natural disasters and the technological disaster.
According to him, natural disasters are associated with God and Nature, which come
to us from afar. While technological disasters, as described by Caruth, are human
product. As they happen because of the negligence of the humans so they always

29
carry a story with them, always leave a moral to be drawn from them and there is
always a blame associated with them. It is almost impossible to imagine a commission
of inquiry, called to discover the causes of some dreadful accident, concluding, “Well,
it just happened.” We look for responsible human agents and we find them”(Caruth,
1995, p. 192).According to Erikson, technological disasters can never be reckoned as
associated with the chance or nature. So,they cause disapproval, fury and indignation
rather than forbearance or tolerance. They give rise to a feeling that thing should not
to have happened. Above all they bring with them a feeling of shock and
vulnerability, which is difficult to be tackled with (Caruth, 1995, p. 192).

Traumatic individuals look the world from different perspective and lens.
They thought that the laws and the decencies by which the world has always been
governed are now ended. Caruth names this changed state of perception as changed
sense of self or a changedworldview(Caruth, 1995, p. 194). Erikson explains that this
is the time where culture or community has to play its role, a kind of a role of a
therapist, where it helps them to construct a manageable reality, to help them to
remove all the fears from their line of vision (Caruth, 1995, p. 194).Thus, Erikson
point of focus remains stick with the community based trauma in his trauma theories.

3.9 Recovery from Psychological Trauma

Trauma destroys the social system of care, protection and meaning that
supports human life. So the recovery from it requires the repairing of all these
systems. Psychological trauma leaves victims with the feeling of disempowerment
and it tends to create a disconnection with the outer world and the people around. So,
the process of recovery should impart empowerment to the survivors and restoration
of their relationship with others. Herman suggests three stages for the recovery
process of the traumatized victims. These three stages of recovery can be recognized
as follows: re-establishing safety, retelling the story of the traumatic event, and
reconnecting with others. Herman’s main focus of analysis has always been on the
trauma of sexually assault victims.

While defining trauma she declares that human body and mind develop trauma
when they are restricted to work against it, conditions in which no escape and no
resistance is possible. In this situation human self defense system becomes overloaded

30
with fear and disorderly (Herman, 2015, p. 34). Herman says that a victim of trauma
may experience fierce emotion without a clear thought of the exact event, or he may
relate everything about the event in a clear way but with almost no emotion(Herman,
2015, p. 34). To support her thesis she gives the example of the Janet’s “dissociation”
of the memory while working with the patients of the hysteria. In Janet’s view
“people with hysteria generally loses the capacity to integrate the memory of the
overwhelming life event”(Herman, 2015, p. 34).

According to Herman, the traumatized people act in way as though their

nervous systems have been disconnected from their present. She further relates the
example of a poet Robert Graves, who recounts that how in his civilian life he
reconnects himself with the trenches of the World War I. Judith Herman then goes to
explain the three major symptoms of the post- traumatic stress disorder, which
according to her are “hyper arousal”, “intrusion”, and “constriction” (Herman, 2015,
p. 35). Hyperarousal, according to the Herman, is a condition in which human defense
system becomes overly attentive to the danger. Explaining further she asserts that
hyper arosal is something in which the victim of trauma becomes over sensitive to
danger, he becomes easily panic and shocked, quick-tempered and sleeps
poorly(Herman, 2015, p. 35).

Defining “Intrusion” she says that it can happen to the survivors even after the danger
has passed and trauma is no more happening. It is about reliving of the trauma by the
survivors. According to her, this situation further bars the survivors to actively take
part into their normal life.She refers to the other researches like Janet, Freud and
Kardiner to explain her point. She says that Janet has described the same situation of
“Intrusion” in her research with a name of “ide'efixé” (Herman, 2015, p. 37). Freud
while working with the first world war veterans, remarked about the similar situation
as, “The patient is, one might say, fixated to the trauma...”(Herman, 2015, p. 37). She
then quotes from the Kardiner, according to whom the fixation on the trauma is one of
the essential features of the combat neurosis. He said, “memories of trauma are not
encoded like the ordinary memories of adults in verbal or linear narratives”(Herman,
2015, p. 37).

The third symptom of trauma according to Herman is Constriction, which

entails the fact that the survivors of the trauma feel completely powerless in the wake

31
of the Post-traumatic stress disorder. Their system of self-defense shuts completely.
According to Herman same system can be observed in animals too, who sometimes
“freeze” their self when attacked by someone. These alterations of consciousness are
at the heart of the third symptom of trauma(Herman, 2015, p. 42).

She further explains that events regarding traumatic incidents are recorded in
the memory or awareness but they still remain disconnected from having any specific
meaning. It thus results in numbing or distorting the perceptions of the survivors. It
even alters the survivor’s sense of time, giving the perception to the victim as
everything is happening in a slow (Herman, 2015, p. 45).She furthers add that it can
happen that a victim of a traumatic event may consider him/her self as detached from
trauma and not a part of it. The person may feel that as though the event is not
happening to her or him, as though she/he is observing everything from outside. She
further adds that this change of consciousness or dissociation is a sort of protection
against unfathomable tragedy and that alerted state of consciousness may be regarded
as the mercy from the nature, a sort of protection against unbearable pain(Herman,
2015, p. 43).She even explains that the survivors may feel the two
contradictoryreactions of intrusion and constriction while facing the traumatic event.
She asserts that it may happen to a survivor that she/he may not be carrying any
symptoms of the trauma, but some outside event similar to that of the traumatic
incident can trigger the symptoms of the trauma long after the original event. This
altered state of consciousness leads the survivor to suspend any connection with the
outside world(Herman, 2015, p. 47).

Herman stresses the fact that the traumatic events call into question the basic
human relationship. The survivors of the traumatic events are prone to limit
themselves to the isolation of their own. They nullify the attachment of family,
friendship, love and community(Herman, 2015, p. 51).She demands for a supportive
rolefor the victims of the trauma by her close relative (Herman, 2015, p. 61). She
criticizes for the use of criticism against the survivors of the traumatic events by the
people those who are living around the survivors. Herman also warns for the blind
acceptance for the survivors. According to the Herman both these habit will further
impede the recovery process of the survivors.

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 Finally she proposes for the acknowledgement of trauma of survivors by the
society. Giving the example of the returning war soldiers, Herman explains that
soldiers have always been very sensitive to the degree of support they encounter at the
home. Returning soldiers often look for the tangible evidence of public
support(Herman, 2015, pp. 70–73).

3.9.1 Establishing Safety

The first stage, according to Herman, of recovery is start with the establishment of
survivor’s safety. Herman asserts that without achieving a reasonable degree of
safety, anything regarding therapeutic work would be futile. Establishing safety
begins with focusing on controlling body and gradually moves outward towards
controlling the environment. Survivors’ body in itself becomes unsafe and emotions
become uncontrollable. Issues regarding safety of body include, the basic health need
and regulation of the bodily functions(Herman, 2002).

Environmental issues include the establishment of save living places, financial

security, safe mobility and a plan for self protection. Most of the patients bar they way
to recovery because of their involvement in unsafe relationship. In order to gain the
autonomy and maintain the peace of mind, survivors should come forward and have
to take the difficult decisions about their self(Herman, 2002).

3.9.2 Traumatic Retelling

The second stage of Herman’s coping mechanism pertains to the fact that the
survivor of the trauma should remember the whole story regarding the traumatic event
and mourn for it. Here the victim would be able to relate what trauma he/she has gone
through. The therapist plays a vital role both as a witness and as a friend; he helps the
survivors to speak the unspeakable. Herman says that by this re-telling of the event
survivor can integrate the traumatic memory into the real memory, where it becomes
the part of survivor’s life story (Herman, 2002). Patient and therapist by working
together construct a full detailed verbal story out of the fragmented parts of the frozen
imagery and sensation, which can easily be situated in time and history.

As facing reality is always hard, so preserving safety should be balance with

facing past. Safe way should be adopted by survivor and listener between constriction

33
and intrusion. Avoiding the traumatic memory leads to stop the recovery process,
while remembering it can lead to painful reliving of the traumatic past. The patient’s
intrusive symptoms should be monitored carefully (Herman, 2002). Survivors often
remain doubtful about their stories, so therapist and patient should develop patience
for unreliability of the story. There is a valid possibility that the story may change, as
story is being constructed through the fragment pieces(Herman, 2002). Traumatic
retelling causes grief but it is necessary to atone the survivorsnfrom trauma.

3.9.3 Reconnecting With Others

Third stage of recovery mechanism belongs to reconnecting with others. By

now, the survivor has regained some capacity for trust. Survivor now can have a trust
on others, as they are pretty clear with their vision that to whom they can trust and to
whom they can’t. Survivor now has begun to take more initiatives in his/her life and
he/she is now in the process of creating their new identity. With others now he/she
ready to make deep relationship. In short, the survivor has found the new meaning of
his/her life. This model of Herman’s coping mechanism would help us to trace the
post-traumatic behavior of the characters.

3.10 History of the Trauma in Psychiatry

From a very earliest involvement of psychiatry with the trauma trope, there
have been continuous arguments going on in the field of psychiatry about trauma that
whether it’s an organic or psychological origin. The English surgeon Jhon Eric
Erichsen described the psychological problems of severely injured patients to organic
causes, and warned that any symptom in this regard should not be mixed with the
symptoms of hysteria(Van der Kolk et al., 1996, p. 48).

Erichsen contemporary page back in 1885 disagreed with him, and proposed
the “railroad spine” symptoms as having the psychological origins. He claimed that
many errors had been made in this regard as scientists were continuously ignoring the
fright while dealing with the subject (Van der Kolk et al., 1996, p. 48).

German Neurologist Herman Oppenheim was the first person to use the term
“traumatic neurosis” in this regard. According to him the fictional problems, during
the severe psychological issues, are produced due to the subtle molecular changes in

34
the central nervous system. The frequent occurrence of cardiovascular symptoms in
traumatized persons, started a long tradition of associating the post-traumatic
problems with “Cardiac neuroses” (Van der Kolk et al., 1996, p. 48).

Charles Samuel Myers, a British military psychiatrist, was the first person to
use the term “shell shock” for the soldiers dealing with traumatic conditions related to
the gunshots. But after some time it became clear that the “shell shock” could be
found easily in soldiers who had never been exposed to gunfire. So, it became clear
that the causes of traumatic conditions were often purely emotional. He, like so many
researcher after him, emphasized the fact that the war neurosis and hysteria were
closely resemble to each other.

3.11 Pierre Janet and Psychological Processing of Trauma

The issue of traumatic origins of hysteria is the most important legacy of the
psychiatry during the last ten years of the 19th century. Janet during his research noted
that hysterical patients were unable to connect with their internal process in order to
get any suitable solution. According to Janet self-awareness remains to be the central
issue in psychological health. According to him for a patient to respond the stress
properly, a lot depends upon the fact how much he feels himself to be connected to
his past and how much he is aware of his present situation. He describes the term
“subconscious”, to describe the collection of memories that form the mental schemes
that guides the person to interact with his/her environment. If he/she remains
successful to integrate his/hermemories of the past events, he/she will allow him/her
self to develop the meaning schemes that will guide them through the challenges(Van
der Kolk et al., 1996, p. 52). Janet proposes that when people experience “vehement
emotions”, their mind can’t match their painful experiences with the existing memory.
As a result the memory of the traumatic event cannot be integrated into personal
awareness;instead they are dissociated from the real consciousness. Janet says that
people feel themselves unable to speak about the trauma, which we understand as
narrative memory. This results according to him in “a phobia of memory”, which
prevents the integration of the traumatic memory to the ordinary consciousness. In
Janet terms the victim becomes “attached” or “fixated”, where he repeatedly finds
himself facing the same trauma again and again with almost no solution.Janet and all
of his contemporaries emphasis on the dissociation as the core pathogenic process that

35
give rise to PTS, while they all reject the psychoanalytical notion of catharsis and
abreaction as the core choices of treatment. Instead they all emphasis on the
integration and synthesis (Van der Kolk et al., 1996, p. 53).

3.12 Abram Kardiner and the Beginning of Integration

In 1939 Abram Kardiner developed new concepts regarding trauma working

on the assumption of Freud. According to him, sometimes patient’s trauma would
take the form of dissociative fugue states. A patient dealing with such situation might
lash out on someone (Van der Kolk et al., 1996, p. 58). Many instances has been
recorded where a patient while traveling through the subway or tunnel falls into the
flashbacks of being in the trenches. Kardiner’s observations of physiological
responses to a psychical problem persisted and taken the form of a school of thought
in America, known as American psychiatrists, who focuses on somatic therapies (Van
der Kolk et al., 1996, p. 59). During the Second World War a new group for study
trauma emerged, became famous as the concentration camp survivors. These
investigators coined the term “Concentration Camp Syndrome”, which included the
symptoms of the PTSD and everlasting personality changes. Most frequent finding
from these studies was the destructive effect of extreme and long lasting stress on
subsequent health (Van der Kolk et al., 1996, pp. 59–60).

3.13 PTSD

The culmination of all the research done in 20th century for getting to know
about the psychological trauma came in 1980, when PTSD was first introduced into
the vocabulary of

American Psychological Association. A study was conducted by Burgess and

Holstrom on Women about the “Rape Trauma Syndrome”, they noted that, “the
terrifying flashbacks and nightmares seen in these women resembled the traumatic
neuroses of war” (Van der Kolk et al., 1996, p. 61).

The third edition of the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual) was
published in 1980 to much of the fanfare and some controversy. The revision
promised to change the psychiatry by scientizing the diagnostic techniques. The main
purpose was to move from the psychoanalytical concepts and classification of earlier

36
DSMs. The new diagnostic criteria emerged from a problem that psychiatry has a
“reliability problem”, a problem that suggest the field more as art than as science.
DSM III attempted to create a rhetorical framework based on disease model of
madness that suggested the cause of mental problem more as physiological. Disease
model approaches mental illness as a biological condition of the brain and not as a
matter of mind and soul.

The proponents of the disease model approach explained that biologizing the
mental illness would reduce the shame associated with mental illness by locating its
cause in the malfunctioning of the brain rather than considering it as moral failing and
weakness of will (Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 84).Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, can be
described as , “the development of characteristic symptoms following a
psychologically traumatic event that is generally outside the range of usual human
experience” (Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 84). The characteristic symptoms of PTSD“re-
experiencing the traumatic event; numbing of responsiveness to, or reduced
involvement with the external world…hyperalertness, difficulty sleeping and
recurrent nightmares, survivor’s guilt, memory impairment and difficulty
concentrating, avoidance of activities that might arouse the memory of the
event”(Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 84). Some of the critics reckoned PTSD as
“fundamentally a disorder of memory”, rather than its relation with the
malfunctioning of the mind (Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 85).

3.14 Refugee Trauma

Refugee Trauma is a biopsychosocialphenomenon. Most of the theoretical

assumptions of the refugee trauma are developed in Europe and North America since
the World War II, although the focus of these studies has always remained on
different cultural and ethnic settings. Studies of traumatic refugees experience
encompass on ethnographic, biomedical and sociopolitical points of view (Boehnlein
& Kinzie, 1995, p. 224).The traditional study of the refugees trauma started with the
research on the victims of the Jewish community of Nazi German (Boehnlein &
Kinzie, 1995, p. 224).

From different theoretical perspectives used for the refugee trauma studies,
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is considered as the most important one.

37
PTSD, although a diagnostic and clinical phenomenon, yet it is largely influenced by
cultural factors over time (Boehnlein & Kinzie, 1995, p. 224). In 1980’s there was a
debate going on over the fact that there was very little empirical research available on
the validity of PTSD diagnosis.

3.15 Traumatic Stress in Historical Context

A short historical overview of the psychological concept of the trauma will

help to better understand the cross-culture refugee trauma. History has recorded the
individual’s and society’s reactions to traumatic events since quite early.About 4,000
years ago Sumerian described profound psychological reaction to the destruction of
the Ur. Thucydides described the social trauma on the break of great plague in the
Athens. In the last 150 years similar reactions have been recorded in the history for
the trauma in different cultures (Boehnlein & Kinzie, 1995, p. 225).

In the mid-nineteenth century England,Erichsen described the “railroad spine

syndrome”,with symptoms attributed to the damage of the spinal cord. The primary
symptoms involved anxiety, stress, problems associated with memory and
concentration, sleeplessness, nightmares and other somatic symptoms(Boehnlein &
Kinzie, 1995, p. 225).

Railroad spine syndrome can be considered as the beginning of the scientific

description of the traumatic neuroses. Beard in 1869 coined the term “neurasthenia”
or nervous exhaustion to explain the non-specific emotional disorders such as
insomnia, headaches and melancholia, which also occurred after traumatic events
(Boehnlein & Kinzie, 1995, p. 225). Stierlin described similar reactions related to the
survivors of the different type of disasters, such as earth-quakes, mines disasters and
volcanic eruptions (Boehnlein & Kinzie, 1995, p. 225).

Mott in 1919 described traumatic reactions within the context of the two major
psychiatric diagnosis of the time: hysteria and neurasthenia. The major symptom he
described was the horrific dreams of the war times, causing the patient to awake in
cold sweats (Boehnlein & Kinzie, 1995, p. 226). Freud came in 1919 with his
pioneering work of psychoanalytical theory. Throughout the 1940’s and 1950’s these
works become increasingly influential and war veterans were largely explained with

38
reference to psychoanalytical theory(Boehnlein & Kinzie, 1995, p. 226).It was
observed by the scientist that psychoanalytical theory was only useful to explain the
mild trauma such as industrial accidents, but it was not good for the massive traumas
such as occurred among World War II combatants, concentration camp survivors, or
refugees groups (Boehnlein & Kinzie, 1995, p. 26).

To solve this issue DM-III came with a new term, post-traumatic stress
disorder in 1980. This new diagnostic technique is heavily being used since to explain
the mass traumas like the traumas of the refugee groups. Investigators are also using
experimental laboratory models in order to register the physiological responses of the
humans and animals in stress (Boehnlein & Kinzie, 1995, p. 227).

3.15.1 Early Refugee Studies

The modern era of refugee studies began with the study of Jewish refugee
from the Nazi Germany after World War II. It has been noted that a consistent series
of symptoms were found during these studies, although a variety of methodologies
were used in these studies(Boehnlein& Kinzie, 1995, pp. 227–228).During 1950’s,
organic factors were considered to be the major factor in the “concentration camp
syndrome”. It was initially thought by the Eitinger that the organic factors such as
trauma, starvation, and infection cause some brain damage, but later he revised his
claim by describing both physical and psychological factors as being part of the
syndrome (Boehnlein & Kinzie, 1995, p. 228).

From the philosophical and political point of view, soon after the World War
II, existential factors were the core of the etiology of trauma. Frankl in his work with
concentration camp survivors in 1969 noted that it was important for concentration
camp survivors to realize that their life still had meanings and the future still had
some promising prospect for them. These early works about the existential and moral
issues proved to be quite influential for the later studies to come (Boehnlein & Kinzie,
1995, p. 229).

3.15.2 Later Refugee Studies

Factors related to the PTSD have been indentified in traumatized Southeast

Asian refugees, who left their native land in 1975 and carried with them the memories

39
of brutal war, escape and concentration camp. Factors in the host countries can
contribute to the reactivation of trauma. Certain events can trigger the traumatic
effects, like watching an accident or exposure to the crime etc. In a study conducted in
the Norway about the Vietnamese refugees, it had been found that the level of distress
did not decrease during the first year of the resettlement. According to this study,
stress plays an independent impact on the metal health of the migrant before and after
the force migration, while the other predictors remain gender, life events and social
support (Van der Kolk et al., 1996, p. 231). Family and network studies have become
more prominent in the recent years with regard to the cross-generational refugee
adjustment.

3.16 Clinical Assessment of Refugee Trauma

The clinical assessment of refugees who are struggling with trauma is a time
taking process, since much of the symptoms of the traumatic effects revealed itself
after years of treatment. One of the major problems in diagnosis and assessment
recorded during the history has been the lack of the nomenclature or the lack of
diagnostic category which explains the symptoms of intrusive thoughts, flashbacks
and avoidance of behavior following severe traumatic events. The delineation of
PTSD in 1980 has been helpful for the clinicians to work with traumatized refugees.
Here, it is important to recognize the fact that in some cases the exposure to the
trauma may lead to PTSD, in other cases the exposure may lead to a traumatic stress
syndrome, which resembles a lot with PTSD in symptoms. There may be some
culture-specific problem regarding the diagnosis of the refugees. For example, at
times refugees feel reluctant to discuss about the prior traumatic events because of the
respect and shame associated with it. This will definitely complicate the process of
diagnosis or assessment. Different other methods can be employed to correctly assess
trauma includes, interviews and Harvard Trauma Questionnaire etc(Van der Kolk et
al., 1996, pp. 35–36).

3.17 Theory of Resilience and Refugee Agency

For decades the fields of social sciences as well as humanities have been
collectively focusing over the consequences of stress. At some point in life many
people go through some serious life threatening traumatic experiences that can result

40
in post traumatic stress disorder. When stress exposure is extremely high, it can result
in the shape of anxiety, depression, burnout and numerous physical conditions. Yet if
there is a concern about the harmful effects of the trauma, there is also an unparalleled
interest in resilience (Southwick et al., 2014).

Most of us are familiar with the concept of resilience as to bend but not to
break rather bounce back and grow in the face of difficult situations. The American
Psychological Association defines resilience as ‘‘the process of adapting well in the
face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats or even significant sources of
stress”(Southwick et al., 2014, p. 2).According to the Fletcher and Sarkar, the specific
nature of definition is often influenced by historical and sociocultural context. They
further explains that most of the definitions of the resilience are based on the two core
concepts: adversity and positive adaptation as he explained, “the personal qualities
that enables one to thrive in the face of adversity’’(Fletcher & Sarkar, 2013)

3.18 Meta Theory of Resilience

Resiliency and resilience theory is based upon three waves of resiliency

inquiry. First wave is about the identification of the resilient qualities of an
individuals and it inquires that what Internal and external qualities are present in
individuals who thrive in the face of difficulties contrary to those who don’t. The first
wave of resiliency is a paradigm shift from looking at the risk factors involve in the
psychosocial problems to the identification of strength of an individual. Some of the
required resilient qualities which have helped individuals to be competent in the face
of high-risk environments are, being robust, socially responsible, adaptable, tolerant,
achievement oriented, a good communicator, self-esteem and having a good self-
efficacy(Richardson, 2002).

The second wave of resiliency inquiry is an attempt to find out how the
resilient qualities are acquired? Flach observes that the resilient qualities are acquired
through a law of disruption and reintegration.This model depicts that; individuals
have a set of protective factors, which are already explained in the first wave that
seeks to stabilize or normalize the situation after some adversity happens. The term
“biopsychospiritual homeostasis” is used to describe this adapted state of mind, body
and spirit. We may perceive this as “in balance”. This balance may be disrupted

41
several times in the life of an individual, by changing in the individual’s life, like
when an individual gets a new job or he gets married or even by sudden
unemployment, etc. To cope with these suddenlife prompts, humans cultivate resilient
qualities. The individual ultimately would start the process of reintegration. Which
have four methods : to reintegrate resiliently (growth through disruption) , to return to
former biopsychospiritual homeostasis (clinging to one’s comfort zone) , to
reintegrate with loss (giving up hope and motivation), to reintegrate dysfunctionally
(return to destructive behavior)(Richardson, 2002).

The third wave investigates the motivational forces and emphasis on developing of
the experiences that foster the ability to utilize these forces for self-actualization.
According to the resilience theory there is a force in everyone that drives them to seek
self- actualization, altruism, wisdom, and harmony with the use of the spiritual force
of inner-self.

This force is resilience and it changes it name with the change in discipline.
According to the Richardson, The resilience theory, following the footsteps of the
postmodern theory, is a representative of how an interdisciplinary inquiry can be
helpful to find out about the motivational force and to utilize it in the time of
adversity. Richardson explains that controlling or driving force towards self-
actualization is already explained in multiple disciplines including Physics,
Philosophy, Eastern Medicine, Neurosciences etc. (Richardson, 2002).

3.19 Resilience in Refugees

After a thorough examination of the theoretical framework of the

psychological term resilience, the more cultural aspects related to the term would be
discussed here in this chapter. Laura Simich and Lisa Andermann discuss the
following aspects in their anthology Refuge and Resilience. Wade E. Pickren, asserts
in the very first essay of the book that human individual lives usually far within the
limits of his power. According to him, humans possess powers of various sorts, which
they habitually fail to use and behave below their possible maximum (Simich &
Andermann, 2014, p. 9). Thus human are adequately resourceful with the amount of
power and energy.

42
 Pickrenultimately defines resilience as a process rather than a static
phenomenon when he says that resilience refers to patters of required behavior in
circumstances where development ceases due to unfortunate experiences (Simich &
Andermann, 2014, p. 17). Currently, resilience is considered more as a cultural
concept that can operate outside psychology. Moreover, resilience literature is
growing in number, which is constructed through narrative revolves around thriving
and growing after the post-traumatic experiences. There are number of other
constructs which bears a family resemblance to resilience. But resilience in migration
is under-theorized (Simich & Andermann, 2014, p. 18). Scholars of cultural studies
put emphasis over the fact that the media and the general perception of refugees in the
host countries are often marked by negative prejudice. Refugees and migrants are
often considered as threat to the host country and they widely regarded as
disadvantage, different or even threatening. As migrants have different understanding
of social relations, obligations and an understanding of self and identity, so they
usually regarded as different on these bases. Due to these differences they are denied
to be treated on humanly level(Simich & Andermann, 2014, p. 19). So, scholars put
an emphasis to recognize the strength of refugees in the wake of the adversity in the
host country. According to the Pickren, refugee’s approaches to health care, child-
rearing, and their close relationship with other migrant members etc., are the cultural
specific practices which serve as a source of strength and sustenance in the host
country. This is little understood and least appreciated feature of the migrant’s
experiences. Most of the research undertaken by the social scientist in the host
country portrays the migrants as a problem, while the need is to focus on cultural
strength and the resiliency of the migrants which they bring with them (Simich &
Andermann, 2014, p. 19).

It is highly intriguing for the western scholars that how individuals who
suffered the worst atrocities of violence, abuse, rape and hardship of sea travel in
small and overcrowded boats, Incarceration in refugee camps, and further challenged
by a new country and a new culture, actually endure all this with an unflinching
resilience. It is contrary to the expectations of the scholars to have very low rate of
mental disorders found in the migrants (Simich & Andermann, 2014, p. 76). So , need
is to stop considering the refugees as unprotected victims(Bélanger-Dumontier, 2014,
p. 274).

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 Beiser, discuss the concept of time splitting with reference to the refugees.
According to him having split the three spheres of time, which are past, present and
future, victims of the enormous stress concentrate on the present. This time splitting is
known as dissociation of memories from consciousness, which is an effective coping
strategy (Simich & Andermann, 2014, p. 76). But according to the Beiser, this coping
mechanism is only useful for the short term and medium term refugees. As with the
long term refugees it becomes very difficult to turn down the past from the
memory(Simich & Andermann, 2014, pp. 77–78).

Beiser explains the importance of having like-ethnic community.According to

him Like-ethnic community is an important social resource to develop the resilience in
the migrants. Beiser explains this concept of like-ethnic community, which is actually
about developing a social connection, with three different perspectives, known as
bonding networks, bridging networks and linking networks. During the bonding stage
migrants try to solidify their relation with their own family and community members
in the host country. Bridging is about creating the connection between the migrants
and other community members. Linkingmeans developing a social connection
between the migrants and the state institutes(Simich & Andermann, 2014, pp. 81–85).

As Pickren explains, the concept of resilience has evolved to a more socially

contextualized understanding. To make a better sense of the refugee resilience, a
better theory is needed that is more cross-culturally valid. Ungar, asserts that greater
emphasis need to be paid to develop a model which simultaneously works for the
individual and for the environment. Ungar emphasis for ecological factors, and has
defined four principlesfor the purpose: decentrality, complexity, atypicality, and
cultural relativity. According to him, these four points will help the theory to move in
a new direction (Simich & Andermann, 2014, p. 169)

3.19.1 Decentrality

It changes the focus from the individual to environmental context, and

particularly what the environment makes available to those who are facing great
adversity like the Peoples who have very low income and are unfamiliar with the
system (Simich & Andermann, 2014, p. 169).

3.19.2 Complexity

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 Is the recognition of the connection between the refugee’s need and non-
linearity in the process of settlement and adaptation. Without stable housing, stable
employment is difficult to find (Simich & Andermann, 2014, p. 169).

3.19.3 Atypicality

Is an over-reliance on a common dichotomous view of factors that affect

resilience, it shows opposing factors that affect resilience. For example, to be the part
of one ethnic community is considered as protective, and failing to do so is a risk.
Atypicality explains how environmental factors are adaptive in some situation while
maladaptive in others (Simich & Andermann, 2014, p. 169).

3.19.4 Cultural Relativity

Determines that believes and values are culturally determined and to understand that
what has motivated a particular behavior, one must understand the role of culture in
shaping the behavior of any particular person(Simich & Andermann, 2014, p. 169).
Thus resilience can be ascribed to more varied character Traits contrary to those
which were explained in the western clinical practice.

3.20 Trauma and Children Literature

As both of the novels selected for this research belong to the category of the
children’s literature, so it is imperative here to reconsider some of the major concepts
regarding psychoanalysis and trauma theory with the perspective of children’s
literature of atrocity. But before proceeding any further, it is appropriate to trace down
the history and origin of the field of children’s literature of trauma and its relation
with the psychoanalytic theory here.

Kenneth Kidd, in his book Freud in Oz writes that the serious study of
children’s literature is said to have started with Freud. Freud was interested in genre
now associated with the children’s literature, the fairy tale. He further elaborates that
it would not be wrong to proclaim that psychoanalysis developed in parts through its
engagement with the children’s literature. Psychoanalysis used children’s literature to
materialize its themes and methods, turning first to folklores and fairytales and then to

45
its material development during the analysis of children’s literary texts(Kidd, 2011, p.
vii).

During the 16th and 17th century, children’s literature was being written mainly
for the didactic and moralistic purpose. During the 19 th century the focus of the filed
shifted towards the travels and adventures of the children and the genre which was
used for writing these stories was folk and fairy tales. The dominant conception of
childhood in this literature was that of the purity and innocence which this literature
sought to be protected. In 20th century, the dominant conception of the childhood
changed and literature concerning the children was becoming more realistic and it
began to appear as an established literary genre (Elshaikh, 2017, p. 10).“Subjects
previously thought too upsetting for children are now deemed appropriate and even
necessary” (Kidd, 2005, p. 120). Much realistic literature about the children and
adolescents deals with traumatic experiences like divorce, racism, class struggle,
immigration problems, wars, terrorism, natural disasters etc. (Kidd, 2011, p.
182).Kidd calls this type of literature as the Literature of Atrocity.

Since late 1980’s and early 1990’s, children’s text about trauma has grown
rapidly. Despite the difficulty of representing the true nature of the trauma, there
seems to be consensus now that children’s literature of trauma is the most appropriate
stage to display the trauma works. And the most appropriate genre has been the
Literature of Atrocity(Kidd, 2011, p. 182). According to the Felman and Laub both
psychoanalysis and literature work as the testimony to the unspeakable, both
recognizing the unconscious witnessing of the subject. So, too, is the function of
children’s literature(Kidd, 2011, pp. 183–185). Children’s literature is both
considered as therapeutic and testimonial.

3.21 Fairy-Tale Form of Children Trauma Literature

Fairy Tales, according to the kidd, revised the trope of the wounded child of
Freud. The wounded but resilient child of the pop-psychoanalysis enables a new form
of genre known as fairy tale(Kidd, 2011, pp. 186–187).Drawing upon the works of
Freud, Burno Bettelheim said that fairy tales help children to work through pain and
daily psychic troubles. And motifs of the fairy tales also emerge in other kinds of texts
too like war and Holocaust literature(Kidd, 2011, p. 122). Through fairy tale, people

46
tell stories about challenge and survival, hardship and hope. Kidd says that by the
1990’s fairy tale became ingrained with pop-culture to give rise to the forms like
picture books, novelizations, films and politically correct satires. Beside it, fairy tales
were remodeled to fit with the key genre of the children’s literature of atrocity (Kidd,
2011, p. 187).

Donald Hasse proposes that fairy tales help to create an environment which
provided affinity between forcibly displaced child’s traumatic experience and the
utopian projects on the one hand, and the landscape of the fairy tales on the other
(Kidd, 2011, p. 187). Kidd further emphasis on the fact that fairy tale brings us closer
to the truth , emotional truth, emotional catharsis for the reader, if not to the truth of
historical accuracy(Kidd, 2011, p. 188).

3.22 Young Adult Children’s Literature

Kidd inFreud in Ozwrites with reference to another theorist Langer’s work In

Using and Abusing the Holocaust that Holocaust narratives should be hopeful and
emphasize survival or resilience rather than the works of literature like 1952 English
translation of Anne Frank’s journal, The Diary of a Young Girl, which according to
him are marked by an absence of pain and the muting of the anguish or a neglect of
death. Langer, in pursuit of the more realistic details of the Holocaust narrative, urges
the recognition of and respect for the pursuit of death in the Holocaust narrative.
According to him, these works with their little trace of deathwork or deathwriting,
deflect us from tackling the authenticity of unbearable truths(Kidd, 2011, p. 189).

Langer further explains in the second chapter of the book, In Using and
Abusing the Holocaust, that Anne herself would have been appalled by the book’s
transformation into a generic story of adolescent fears and hopes. Langer further
criticizes the readers for accepting and promoting the idea that her Diary is a major
Holocaust text. Langer even proposes that Diary as a work is designed to avoid the
very experience of persecution. Langer objects its validity as the generic text by
saying that this text obscures the harsh realities of the mass murder crushing
despair(Kidd, 2011, pp. 189–190). Langer further criticizes its canonization as the
master piece of the Holocaust narrative and he doesn’t rely on its reputation as a

47
young adult text. He further argues for its decanonization on the basis of its refusal of
apparently adult themes of despair and death(Kidd, 2011, p. 190).

Barbara Harrison reports that since the 1987, over three hundred children’s
books had been published in the United States alone on World War II, the Holocaust,
and the war in general. Barbara further notes that despite the acceptance of the more
serious topics like war and genocides in children’s literature, the one characteristic
which has diminished completely and which are not accepted among the young reader
is hope. According to him the cultural politics of “hope” are quite messy when it
comes to trauma narrative(Kidd, 2011, p. 191).

The act of reading trauma writing is expected to be both as traumatizing and

strengthening at the same time. Katharine Capshaw Smith writes in her introduction
to a special journal forum, because children are considered to be innocent they are
depicted almost iconographically as the ideal victims of trauma, those who need the
protection and guidance of the elderly people. Children are portrayed as the survivors
of trauma, those who can provide the adults the spiritual guidance to work through the
pain via love, trust and hope and determination (Smith, 2005, p. 116). The classic
dialectic of innocence and experience intersects and give rise to the dialectic of
protection and exposure. These sorts of texts are known as confrontational texts.
These confrontational texts according to Baer are time travel novels, operate in a
magical realist form (Kidd, 2011, p. 192).

The protagonists of the children’s traumatic novel seem to expose to a

subjective splitting, even shattering, from which they must rise to a more adult self.
Another form of young adult fiction is the historical trauma fiction. Kidd says that
historical trauma fiction has become a metadiscourse of personal suffering which
demands pain from readers as a proof of their engagement. The genre seems to
thematize the exchange of reader with the protagonist(Kidd, 2011, pp. 193–194).

3.23 Picture Books and Children Trauma

Picturebook as a genre is deeply associated with the emotional and imaginative lives
of children (Kidd, 2011, p. 104). Picturebook offers the most dramatic form of
testimony of trauma. Because of its association with early childhood and its visual

48
power, this form has a great power to shock and to educate. The high time for the
picturebook as a preferred genre for trauma work seems to have come in the 1980’s.
Cech holds the point that picturebooks must engage with the socio-political realities
of the world, without overly emphasizing on young readers. Picturebooks are there to
equip our children with the political vision and moral courage to fight against these
conditions (Kidd, 2011, p. 197).

Like fairytales and young adult novels, the picturebook has long been attached
with the war and trauma theme. The picturebook is widely considered as the
psychological genre. Galbraith believes that the picturebooks forged in the crucible of
trauma, tend to communicate powerfully with the generations of readers. Picturebook
operates as a secondary or revised survival schema that points to primary survival
schema development in childhood(Kidd, 2011, pp. 197–205).

3.24 Psychoanalysis, Trauma Theory & the Children’s Literature of

Atrocity

Since the early 1990’s the children books about the trauma have proliferated.
Despite of the difficulties of representing trauma, children literature’s is considered to
be the most appropriate forum for trauma work. Thus, Baer in her seminal work A
New Algorithm of Evil: Children’s Literature in a Post-Holocaust World emphasizes
on the requirement of a children’s literature of atrocity in the recent times. She calls
this type of literature as the the confrontational texts(Kidd, 2005, p. 120). She
proposes the direct confrontation of the traumatic experience for the young reader
rather than to be protected from it. The exposure model became necessary because we
could no longer deny the exposure of the child with the evil. Baer now can insist that
there’s such a thing as “sufficient” confrontation with trauma and Holocaust. Counter
tropes of Holocaust narrative deny the confrontation by saying that confrontation is
impossible or always insufficient. But despite of all these countering tropes,
Holocaust has become a legitimate subject and trauma seems to be best fitted with
children’s literature(Kidd, 2005, p. 121).

Recent academic theorists privilege literature and psychoanalysis as

interrelated forms for trauma testimony. And children’s literature is rightly
understood both as therapeutic as well testimonial among all other genres.

49
Psychoanalysis and literature are so entangled that they both help to articulate
discourses for each other. For example, fairy tales have helped articulate
psychoanalytical discourse. And in case of the trauma writing, one might ask how our
understanding of trauma is discursive and what if psychoanalysis isn’t the best
method for the treatment of trauma. Cvetkovich’ work demonstrates the value of
integrated approach to trauma, one in which psychoanalysis doesn’t remain the
dominating interpretive approach. Kidd argues that as psychoanalysis and children’s
literature shares many of central themes and institutional practices, it doesn’t mean
that we can treat one discourse as method and other as material. Psychoanalysis is not
just a method. It’s a field, subject and method at once. It’s a set of foundational rules,
ideas and texts. So, better is to check the interdependence of the two field (Kidd,
2005, pp. 122–123).

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CHAPTER 4

ANALYSIS

After outlining the basic theoretical assumptions for this thesis, we will next explore
the corpus of novels for the purpose of analysis. What follows are two analyses
focused on the particular novels chosen for this research. In order to get the desired
objectives and working on our required research questions we will engage a range of
theoretical considerations presented earlier. The two novels have distinctively
different narrative structures, so each analysis might at first glance seems
disconnected from the other but in a larger context of the refugee experience both of
these novels are very much connected. Choice of literature can roughly be segregated
between the Global North and South. AtiaAbawi, just because of her Afghan lineage,
is representing the voice of the Global South,whileElizabeth Laird is contributing
form the Global North.

A LAND OF PERMANENT GOODBYES

4.1 AtiaAbawi: An Introduction to the Novelist

AtiaAbawi is an American young adult novelist and television journalist. A

dual Afghan-American citizen, she was born a refugee in Germany after her parents
fled the civil war in Afghanistan in 1981. She graduated from Virginia Polytechnic
Institute and State University. After graduating she worked as a reporter in a local TV
channel in Maryland.

Afterwards, she moved to Atlanta to work for CNN and then for NBC NEWS. As an
author she has two well acclaimed books on her credit. Her first book, “The Secret
Sky: A Novel of Forbidden Love in Afghanistan”, was published by Penguin Random
House in September 2014. It is an astonishing, heartbreaking story of love between a
Hazaran girl Fatima and Pashtun boy Samiullah. Her second novel, “A Land of
Permanent Goodbyes”, was published in January 2018. It is equally a powerful novel
of refugee escaping the war-torn Syria and part of analysis of this research.

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4.2 A Land of Permanent Goodbyes: An Overview

The novel A land of Permanent Goodbyes is written by AtiaAbawi and

published in 2018. The book revolves around a harrowing journey of a young boy
Tareq from a war-torn Syria to Europe. Novel opens with bombing in the Tareq’s
Syrian town, when one of the bombs falls on Tareq’s small apartment and kills much
of his family. Upon this tragic outcome his father decides to take his remaining
children, Tareq and his younger sister Susan, and flee to Europe. The journey was
never an easy task to be taken as they have to passed through the Daesh checkpoints,
public witnessing to beheading, extreme weather conditions, border crossing and
much more.

Tareq, Susan and his father first travel to Turkey, where Tareq has to move further
ahead in Greece as a Refugee via Aegean Sea through raft, leaving his father back in
Turkey.Tareq with her sister Susan meets horror after horror during this journey as
people are swept away from capsized raft never to return. In the final stage of his
journey he lands in Germany with his little sister Susan but things are utterly changed
for him. His life has completely changed during the journey and he has defied all the
odds to reach the final destination of his maturity. While this is a story of one family,
it is also a timeless tale of all the wars, all tragedies and all the refugees.

4.3 Tareq’s Trauma and the Elision of Memory

Novel starts with the Tareq’swaking of a horrified nightmare of bombing on

his family apartment in a small town of Syria. He wakes with a black out of vision
and almost all hallucinated totally unaware of the world surrounds him. This is typical
of a person dealing with the aftershocks of trauma and tries to fit into the scheme of
things. The Elision of a Memory as explained by Caruth is a term which means that a
traumatic eventproduces loss of memory for a short period of time and in Freud’s
terminology it is known as the Latency of Trauma .Novel relates this loss of memory
of Tareq as, “His blacked-out vision slowly transitioned to a blurry haze of grayish
mist”(Abawi, 2018, p. 10). The experience of destruction of his small house in a
dream haunts him so much that he almost forgets about his surrounding and he
struggles to regain his exposure. “Too scared to move, all he could do was scream
again, hoping someone—anyone—would hear him. His vibrating body was

52
camouflaged in the rubble…But he couldn’t muster the strength to push it
off...”(Abawi, 2018, p. 10).According to Freud traumatic experience can only be
understood after a Latency period, a period in which the memory of a traumatic event
becomes lost over time but then regains in a symptomatic form when triggered by
some similar event (Richter, 2018, p. 361).Freud and Breuer says, Hysterics suffer
this psychic pain even in the waking consciousness as does by Tareq, “No, Mama,
I’m just… just so happy to see you!” he muttered as the rubble from his dream flashed
in his mind. He could again taste the fear of being separated from her”(Abawi, 2018,
p. 12). Tareq even switches on his defense mechanism by dissociating his memory
from the scenes of destruction lay open in their apartment surroundings in shape of
debris and rubble cause by aerial bombing. “As Tareq took in the view of his
neighborhood, his breath caught in his throat. He still wasn’t used to the mountain of
broken concrete and twisted iron sticking out of the walls that used to make up the
apartment block across the road... Tareq shook his head in an attempt to scatter those
memories, hoping they would fall out of his ears like crumbs” (Abawi, 2018, p. 14).
According to the Cathy Caruth, trauma repeats itself in flash backs which re-enacts
the whole event as mind can’t represent it otherwise. Novel presents its protagonist
dealing with the same situation when Tareq rekindles his traumatic flash back while
listening to TV news.“The barrel bombs struck a residential area, killing dozens of
people, including many children,” the television report echoed. Tareq’s nightmare
came flashing back.” (Abawi, 2018, p. 17). It even endorses to the Judith Lewis
Herman’s claim that some outside event similar to that of the traumatic incident can
trigger the symptoms of the trauma in an individual who may not be dealing with it
previously (Herman, 2015, p. 47).

Soon the nightmares turn to reality and Tareq apartment is bombed out in
reality in an air-strike leaving most of his family members dead in the outcome.
Abawi depicts the related scenes in connotations suited best for the explanation of
trauma. The concepts like emptiness, numbness, amnesia, pain and guilt, all find their
place in the text. Numbness is an important term related to the traumatic event. Judith
Herman says that, “events regarding traumatic incidents are recorded in the memory
or awareness but they still remain disconnected from having any specific meaning. It
thus results in numbing or distorting the perceptions of the survivors.”Tareq feels
numbing his body almost impervious of the physical pain when he was being taken to

53
the hospital after the attack. “The physical pain was numbed by the enormous
emptiness in his soul” (Abawi, 2018, p. 22). While in the hospital when he was
searching his smart phone to find the photos of his family members in order to share it
with the doctor, the survivor’s guilt got his icy hand on him leaving him guilt ridden
and sorrowful. “The doctor continued to wrap, tuck and bandage as Tareq scanned his
photos. He felt guilt and pain as he swiped past the lively, smiling faces of his mother,
grandmother and Farrah” (Abawi, 2018, p. 24). While traveling to his uncle’s house
in Raqqa alongside his father and younger sister Susan, survivors of the incident, his
mind races to find the traces of his lost brother Salim, he thinks, “What if Salim was
able to get out?...Maybe he was too dazed. Maybe he has amnesia like they do in the
movies when someone has head trauma” (Abawi, 2018, p. 28).

Another important concept regarding trauma is the unspeakability of the

traumatic event. Trauma’s unspeakability explains that extreme experience
destabilizes both language and consciousness, causing lasting damage and demanding
unique narrative expressions to be related to others (Richter, 2018, p.
363).Unspeakability in Tareq’s case is evident in many parts of the novel. One such
instance is seen at the point when he reaches to his uncle’s house in Raqqa and the
next morning he struggles to answer back toher Aunt Nada, who asks him, “Did you
sleep well?” and in reply he only utters “Yes”, although“He wanted to tell her about
his vivid nightmares and why the dark circles around his eyes wouldn’t disappear”
(Abawi, 2018, p. 47). According to the Laub, this impossibility of talk arises from the
very overpowering nature of the traumatic experience, which shapes the victim’s
experience in a many ways but which has no substantial form expect of an uncanny
repetitious acting out (Goodhart, 1992).

4.4 Refugees Trauma

Right in the very beginning of the novel Abawi establishes the idea of the
refugee trauma and their migration. “After the strike that killed his family, Fayed
decided that he needed to get his two surviving children out of his homeland” (Abawi,
2018, p. 29).Chronic effects of the trauma found among refugees include fear and
paranoia, mistrust along with chronic personality changes. Depression, anxiety and
multiple somatic symptoms are also other effects which trauma causes among the
survivors. These symptoms often directly disabled survivors’ social adjustment and

54
resulted in hopelessness and loss of previously enjoyed activities (Boehnlein &
Kinzie, 1995, pp. 227–228). All of these chronic effects can easily be traced among
most of the refugee characters of the novel.

To access the trauma regarding the protagonist alongside other refugee

characters, it is better to divide the traumatic experiences faced by characters into
three phases. These three phases include the force displacement, the harrowing
journey and the arrival in the host country.

4.5 Forced Displacement

The first phase of the Forced Displacement depends solely on the ever
worsening political situation in Syria. And this very political factor imparts a new
strength to our analysis of the novel as trauma in this scenario not solely remains as an
individualistic trauma, which is the basic requirement of the traditional model of
trauma quite prevalent in the western world, rather it takes a more sophisticated form
in which level of analysis is focused on the political, historical and socio-economic
factors. This more sophisticated model of trauma is known as non-western and
postcolonial model of trauma. “As critics and theorists working in non-Western
studies have emphasized, trauma is not only to be understood as an individual,
psychological, and/or physical response, but also as a collective, political, and cultural
condition with far-reaching material and immaterial dimensions” (John Roger Kurtz,
2018, p. 126).

Kia Erikson, in his ground breaking essay Notes on Trauma and Community,
defines the collective trauma of a community, which according to him is due to the
damaged attachment patterns that sustained a community. According to him the,
“gradual realization that the community no longer exists as an effective source of
support and that an important part of the self has disappeared” (Caruth, 1995, p. 187;
Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 147). Erikson further elaborates it by saying that when a
community faces a trauma, it shatters the communal sense of the people. “I” continue
to exist, though spoiled. “You” continue to exist, though far away. But “we” as a
connected pair no longer exist(Caruth, 1995, p. 187; Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 147).
Erikson argues that there is always a social dimension to trauma and trauma can also
be the foundation of the community.

55
 Erikon’s main focus regarding trauma is on the tissues of the community’s
mind. He says that traumatized communities are different from a group of traumatized
persons. He further explains that tissues of a community can be damaged much like
the same way as the tissues of body and mind. According to him trauma always has a
social dimension (Caruth, 1995, p. 185). He even claims that trauma of community
can work the same way as do the common language and common background, to
impart the feeling of unity. According to Erikson, there is a difference between the
individual and collective trauma. He defines individual trauma as a blow to the
individual’s psyche, which breaks through one’s protective system quickly without
giving one the chance to be settled down. While, according to him, the collective
trauma is a blow to the tissues of social life that destroys the communal bond between
the people (Caruth, 1995, p. 187).

According to Caruth there are two form of community trauma, whether taken
alone or in combination, harm to the tissues of the community that bound the people
together and formation of general feelings, moods and attitude part of the social
climate (Caruth, 1995, p. 190). A land of Permanent Goodbyes, presents a fine
example of community trauma, where damaged attachment patterns of the Syrian
community is clearly visible. The society is disintegrating and the tissues of the
community are badly injured; as a result the communal bond between the people has
destroyed complete and they no longer exist as a community. “This was what Syria
had become, a land of permanent goodbyes” (Abawi, 2018, p. 22). Tareq, the
protagonist of the novel, is well aware of this communal disintegration and on many
occasion in the novel he shows his concern regarding this. “Syria is gone ”(Abawi,
2018, p. 53).

According to Bloch and Dona Many millions of international migrants leave their
habitual places of residence due to the multiplicity of reasons which can roughly be
divided into three broad categories known as

 Impoverishment: Which means lack of livelihood opportunity, food

insecurities etc.
 Governance Fragility: State and political fragility.
 Rights deficit: Religious and ethnic discrimination, generalized violence,
failure of rule of law, human rights depravation (Baloch, 2018, p. 135).

56
 All thesethree factors can clearly be seen playing a major role in shaping the first-
flight of the migrants in the novel. Novel presents several situations in which
characters are found to talk about the scarcity of food. For example in chapter 6,
Tareq realized his aunt looked thinner, “her cheeks gaunt and nose pointy”, because
of the scarcity of food. Narrator explains the impoverished situation of both Syria and
Raqqa as,

The last several years of war had visibly affected them as it had affected all of
Syria. Food was scarce, and the supplies you could find in the markets had
drastically risen in price—even in places like Raqqa, once considered one of the
breadbaskets of the country.(Abawi, 2018, p. 49)

Government fragility is evident in the intense state and political situations, where state
has changed its role from the protector of the human rights to the one which plunders
and oppresses. “But it was the men dressed in black that they could see in the distance
that sent a shiver down Tareq’s spine: the shabiha, the pro-Assad civilian militia who
invoked terror for the government” (Abawi, 2018, p. 33).

Rights deficit is the last broad category that compels millions to seek refuge in foreign
lands. Religious discriminations, generalized violence and intra-state armed conflicts
all seem to be the primary motivator for migration among the characters of the
novel.“Daesh was unforgiving and ruthless in their atrocities and horrors… Daesh is a
group of thugs who latched onto a religion in order to spread their darkness” (Abawi,
2018, p. 38). Musa, Tareq’s cousin, points towards the excesses of the Daesh in a
most poignant way when he discloses the appropriations of Raqqa’s posh areas and
business centers by Daesh, he says, “Most of the businessmen and government
officials are gone. Some were even executed…” (Abawi, 2018, p. 55). On their
market tour in Raqqa, Musa explains to Tareq about the hardcore fundamentalist
assumptions and practices of theDaesh, he says, “It’s like two different worlds in this
city now. Them and us …These people don’t know the first thing about
Islam”(Abawi, 2018, p. 55).

Apart from these three broad categories, one factor which is equally powerful
in shaping the life of the million of the Syrian migrant and to their traumas is the
foreign hegemonic influenceof different hegemonic powers. Syria has become the

57
living hellfor its own people, as Tareq remarks, “Syria is gone…The people who run
this place are not Syrians. This land no longer belongs to our people” (Abawi, 2018,
p. 53). Hegemonic powers are plundering Syria as their rightful prey. Musa rightly
sums up the same notion in one of his remark. He says, “It feels like our whole
country is living in an alternate reality. You’ve got Russia, Assad and even America
in the air, and Daesh, the Free Syrian Army and militias on the ground” (Abawi,
2018, p. 53).

4.6 Harrowing Journey

The second phase of analysis of the refugee trauma in the novel pertains to the
Harrowing Journey of the refugee characters. Although at first glance it seems to be a
traumatic story of only one family. On a deeper level it is the timeless story of the
whole refugee community around the globe. Experiences of all the other refugees are
reflected though the experiences of the young Tareq, who shows an indomitable
courage and resilience in the wake of trauma.

According to Dona and Bloch, Borderscapesexpress the spatial and conceptual

complexity of the border as a space that is fluid and shifting; a space
transversed not only by bodies but also discourses and relationship that
redefine inside and outside, citizen and non-citizen, host and guest across
state, regional, racial and other symbolic boundaries.(Baloch, 2018, p. 52)

Abawi gives rise to the most postcolonial and non-western interpretation to traumatic
effect of the refugees when she questions the conventional boarder lines that exists
between the countries. Here Tareq becomes the mouthpiece of the writer and
questions the boundaries that segregate the people as inside and outside.

The invisible lines in your world hold so much power…Your eyes do not see
them, but whether you live or die can depend on which side you stand on. The
trajectory of your life is conditional … On the other side, the only danger from
the sky is the storm that rolls in, shooting lightning through the clouds, or from
the birds that flap their wings, dropping their lunch on an unsuspecting street
merchant. Children go to school kicking rocks while filling the air with the

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 music of their laughter. There are still problems, but your chances of survival
outweigh a premature demise.(Abawi, 2018, pp. 71–73)

In the late 20th century, doctors and researchers recognized that the refugees and
immigrants suffer from a large variety of physical and psychological disorders
resulting from their migration …common among them are schizophrenia and
depression(Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 288). Tareq as a traumatic character often falls into the state
where he seems to be a schizophrenic. Near to the Turkish border, when he was about the
cross the border with his family he falls to his schizophrenia and meets with his disappeared
little brother Salim. “He suddenly saw a misty vision of Salim standing beside him…
But he knew he was alone. This was all in his head”(Abawi, 2018, p. 78).

Refugees face many stressors when they leave their homelands and try to
acculturate into a new host country, these include loss of familiar social relations,
lowered socioeconomic conditions, lack of fluency in the host language, or values and
behaviors that clash with the ethnic traditions of the native country of the
refugees(Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 289).

Tareq and his father in Turkey face all these stressors and this urges Tareq to
take another harrowing journey along with her little sister Susan to Germany. Tareq
not only loses connection with his country but he also has to face the desertion of his
father soon after they enter in to Turkey. Fayed and Susan stays in to Gaziantep a
border town, while both Musa and Tareq leaves for the Istanbul, a transcontinental
city, just for the better prospects of getting a good job there. But it was a last familiar
connection for him which he has to left and that increases his estrangement in a new
country. “Are you and Susan okay?” Tareq asked his father, his ear pressed against
the telephone. It had been nearly four months since he saw them last” (Abawi, 2018,
p. 80). Shayma, a refugee girl from the Syria, in a café in “Little Syria” mourns for
the loss of her beloved country and the familiar social relations in a song which she
sings in front of her own community members.

“Goodbye, Home—never leave us

We didn’t want to go . . .”(Abawi, 2018, p. 89)

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Despite his utmost efforts in a new country Tareq can’t raise his standard of living
and his lower economic status and this thing becomes a continuous source of trauma
for him.

Tareq had walked so much of the city in search of employment that his feet
oozed with blisters.Every so often someone would take pity on him and give
him a job for the day. Even bohemian Rami employed him a few times a week
to wash dishes and clean the bathrooms and floors. (Abawi, 2018, p. 93)

Lack of fluency in language is another factor that bars Tareq progress in Turkey. He
seems infuriated at the outcome that Musa performs superbly in the same situation but
he is not. “His agitation toward Musa had been building for weeks, upset at how well
his cousin was adjusting to this new country. How he’d been able to learn the
language. Talk to the locals. And get better-paying jobs than him”(Abawi, 2018, p.
100).

Struggling from all these stressors Tareqdecides to leave for the Europe but for
it he has to cross the Mediterranean Sea via raft. “Dogs live better than we do…. At
least in Europe we’ll have opportunities that we aren’t allowed here” (Abawi, 2018, p.
96). Fayed comes with Susan in Istanbul in order to cross the Mediterranean along
with his son Tareq, but due to the lack of finance it is decided that only Susan and
Tareq will embark on a journey with the help of human traffickers.

4.7 Tareq’s Journey to Europe and the Role of Resilience and Agency

The American Psychological Association defines resilience as ‘‘the process of

adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats or even significant
sources of stress” (Southwick et al., 2014, p. 2).

Tareq undoubtedly is a standout character among all, when it comes to adapting the
pain and trauma in the wake of adversity. Right from the very beginning of the novel
he excels over all other characters in bravery and resiliency. He is only a teen age guy
but he clearly retains the mind and heart of a grown up man. Multiple times in the
novel he goes through the test of resiliency, and every time he comes out as
victorious. “Baba, we need to go back and find Salim! ...Ibni…You must stop,
Please…Do it for your sister. She can’t keep hearing this—it will only hurt her more”

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(Abawi, 2018, p. 28). Many times he has been given the responsibility of a caretaker
and protector of his family and every time he remains successful in doing so.

Richardson explains three stagesof what we call the resiliency Inquiry of any
specific character living in high-risk situations. First wave is about the identification
of the resilient qualities of individuals and it inquires that what Internal and external
qualities are present in individuals who thrive in the face of misfortune contrary to the
persons who don’t. The first wave of resiliency is a shift of perception from looking at
the risk factors involve in the psychosocial problems towards the recognition of an
individual strengths (Richardson, 2002).

Tareq has his own peculiar qualities which make more resilient a character
than the others. He is caring and protective, highly adaptable and tolerant, strong and
robust, spiritual and visionary. All these qualities make him survive well during his
journey to theEurope. While getting on board in a raft Tareq shows utmost care and
protection towards his sister as he always does. “He held his sister’s little hand.
“Whatever you do, don’t let go of me,” he commanded.” (Abawi, 2018, p. 159).He
proves to be the strongest of all when he presents himself without hesitation to drive
the busted raft to the Greece coast while swimming.

I’m not very good, but I used to swim in the Euphrates with my cousin…He
labored through the freezing temperature… But as time passed…Tareq’s leg
spasms more painful and intense. Confidence and hope began to drain as their
hands and limbs went numb.(Abawi, 2018, pp. 175–176)

Tareq is undoubtedly a visionary and spiritual being; prior to his entrance in Turkey
and Greece his he meets with his another self in the form Salim apparition who
informs him of his successful journey and consoles him of his morbid thoughts. “He
suddenly saw a misty vision of Salim standing beside him…I don’t want to leave
you…You have to. Think of Susan.”(Abawi, 2018, p. 78).The apparition of Salim
consolesTareq while embarking on a journey to Greece. “I will race you there... He
ran toward the sea, yelling back...You get on the boat and take care of Susan, and I
will swim!”(Abawi, 2018, p. 154).

The second wave of resiliency inquiry is an attempt to find out that how the
resilient qualities are acquired. This model depicts that; individuals have a set of

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protective factors, which are already explained in the first wave that seeks to stabilize
or normalize the situation after some adversity happens. The term “biopsychospiritual
homeostasis” is used to describe this adapted state of mind, body and spirit. We may
perceive this as “in balance”.

This balance may be disrupted several times in the life of an individual, by

changing in the individual’s life, like when an individual changes a job or he gets
married or even by sudden unemployment, arguing and minor accident etc.
Disruptions lead to introspection. Hurt, loss, guilt, perplexity, confusion are some
primary emotions that surface in the wake of disruption. Individual enters into a “poor
me” state and needs a help form outside which could be in the form of a listener or a
sympathizer. To cope with these sudden life prompts, humans nurture, through
previous experience, resilient qualities so that most events become routine and stop
disrupting.The individual ultimately would start the process of reintegration. Which
have four methods : to reintegrate resiliently (growth through disruption) , to return to
former biopsychospiritual homeostasis (clinging to one’s comfort zone) , to
reintegrate with loss (giving up hope and motivation), to reintegrate dysfunctionally
(return to destructive behavior) (Richardson, 2002).

Tareq acquires his biopsychospiritual homeostasis or comforting zone through

the protective factors or qualities that have already been explained in the wave one.
Every time when a new stressor or disruption enters in his life he copes with it and
tries to reintegrate himself, sometimeby contemplating or devising his own distracting
method or sometime by the help of others in the form of consoling.“But then his mind
flashed to the woman’s lifeless eyes as they stared at him through the crystal blue
waters…He shook his head. Fall from my ears. I don’t need this right now.…And the
truth is, they will never fully fade…He will continue to have flashbacks and
nightmares throughout his life…But it’s not a weakness or even an illness...To feel
empathy(Abawi, 2018, p. 220). He considers this empathy as a power that comes with
pain and burden.

The third wave investigates the motivational forces and emphasis on

developing of the experiences that foster the ability to utilize these forces for self-
actualization. According to the resilience theory every human being has a force in
them that guides them to seek self-actualization, selflessness, wisdom and harmony

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by using the spiritual power of inner-self. This force is resilience and it changes it
name with the change in discipline. According to the Richardson, The resilience
theory, following the footsteps of the postmodern theory, is a representative of how an
interdisciplinary inquiry can be helpful to find out about the motivational force and to
utilize it in the time of adversity. Richardson explains that controlling or driving force
towards self-actualization is already explained in multiple disciplines including
Physics, Philosophy, Eastern Medicine, Neurosciences etc. (Richardson, 2002).

Resilience is about finding motivational centers in client, and most of the

clients are of the view that their strength comes from their God or a creative force.
Thus it becomes clear from these examples that environmental and ecological sources
trigger resilience in people. Thus Resilience and resilience theory is all about finding
the strength for an individual in the wake of adversity and then nurture it. Thus
Resilience and resilience theory is all about finding the strength for an individual in
the wake of adversity and then nurture it. Resilient based therapy is all about
exploring the client’s innate resilience or human spirit. And to fulfill the explorative
mission into a client’s inner resilience, the therapist should him/her self understand
and feel the resilience at first (Richardson, 2002).

While traveling towards the Aegean Coast of Izmir in a van he complains to

God about his miseries “Why, God? Why?....Why would you do this to us?...But then
he heard his father’s voice…God has guided you this far and will continue to guide
you forward” (Abawi, 2018, pp. 141–142).

4.8 The Arrival in the Host Country

“Look at those birds, so carefree. They don’t need passports” (Abawi, 2018, p.
139).

Third and the final phase of our analysis pertain to the arrival of the refugee
characters in the host country. In this phase we will try to focus on some of the very
important concepts related to refugee trauma, which includes the settlement of
refugees in to host country, testimony and witnessing of trauma and the coping
mechanism adopted by the helpers or settlement workers in order to provide the
emotional and material support to the settlers.

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4.9 Alexia as apowerful Character and a Volunteer

Alexia, after Tareq, is the second most important character of the novel. She is
a volunteer working on the shores of the Greece as a helper or settlement worker. She
comes to Greece on vacation, but after witnessing the suffering of a refugee family
decides to stay in the Island as a volunteer worker. She herself belongs to the family
of immigrants, as her father was a Jewish refugee in America, while her mother a
descendant of immigrants from Greece. Her own refugee background prompts her to
adopt the status of volunteer settlement worker and leave her university in
Connecticut America.

Are we really any different from them? She said, trying to convince her
parents through video chat not only to let her stay, but also to help pay for it.
Although displeased with her missing school, Ilia and Maria understood, and
deep down they were proud of their daughter. (Abawi, 2018, p. 110)

Only just because of her Greece proves to be an oasis in the desert, a Safe Heaven,
where Tareq can stay and relax for a while and then move further towards his destined
safe country, here Germany. Although stranger for Tareq at first sight, what someone
would call as different worlds, she brings such a force with herself that she
completely changes his life forever. “There was someone that Tareq had yet to meet.
She’d been waiting for him in Europe, as she worked on the shores of Greece”
(Abawi, 2018, p. 107).

4.10 Coping Mechanism

Trauma destroys the social system of care, protection and meaning that
supports human life. So the recovery from it requires the repairing of all these
systems. Psychological trauma leaves victims with the feeling of disempowerment
and it tends to create a disconnection with the outer world and the people around. So,
the process of recovery should impart empowerment to the survivors and restoration
of their relationship with others. Herman suggests three stages for the recovery
process of the traumatized victims. These three stages of recovery can be recognized
as follows: re-establishing safety, retelling the story of the traumatic event, and
reconnecting with others.

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4.10.1 Establishing safety

The first stage, According to Herman, of recovery is to establish the survivor’s

safety. Herman asserts that without achieving a reasonable degree of safety, anything
regarding therapeutic work would be futile. Establishing safety begins with focusing
on controlling body and gradually moves outward towards controlling the
environment. Being a volunteer Alexia with her co-workers always remains ready to
establish the safety for the survivors.She takes so much pain of her work as a
volunteer and a therapist that she often can be seen entangled with the past
memoriesof volunteering acts, where she tries to reassess her failures with a view to
not to repeat them again.“Thoughts of past landings rushed through Alexia’s head.
Regrets and mistakes that she didn’t want to make again”(Abawi, 2018, p. 195).

And soon after this thought, Tareq and his fellow refugees land on the shore in
Greece and volunteers and helpers rush to help them.

Here! Famke rushed an infant to Alexia, who was also knee-deep in the
translucent Aegean. The frigid temperature sent stings shooting up and down
her legs. But the chaos of the moment numbed her from taking in the pain.The
baby’s body was rattling. Alexia held her close to her chest and instinctively
started to huff warm breath on the tiny crimson face. Carefully she navigated
the slimy rocks as she pounded toward the beach.Mariam! Sivan! she called
out, looking for the two medics.(Abawi, 2018, p. 197)

Susan catches hypothermia and looks dazed. “Susan’s eyes were dazed and her lips
pale. Her teeth had stopped chattering. Terror ripped through Tareq…His eyes
screamed, Please help her! The young woman’s (Alexia) replied, You can trust me”
(Abawi, 2018, pp. 199–201).

4.10.2 Traumatic Retelling

The second stage of Herman’s coping mechanism pertains to the fact that the
survivor of the trauma should remember the whole story regarding the traumatic event
and mourn for it. Here the victim would be able to relate what trauma he/she has gone
through. The therapist plays a vital role both as a witness and as a friend; he helps the
survivors to speak the unspeakable. Herman says that by this re-telling of the event

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survivor can integrate the traumatic memory into the real memory, where it becomes
the part of survivor’s life story (Herman, 2002).

Alexia takes both the role of a therapist and of a witness when she comes to a stark
realization about herself that she never allows herself to have a real conversation with
any of the survivors. She now wants to bridge the gap between herself and the
refugees she helps. By deciding so, she seems well aware of the fact that her act of
speaking with the refugees would help them recover from their traumatic memories as
proposed by the Herman.

As Alexia scanned the grounds of the transit camp, she came to a stark
realization. For many months she had helped the people who passed through,
but she’d never had a real conversation with any of them… On this day,
Alexia decided to take an active step in bridging the gap between herself and
the refugees she helped to save.(Abawi, 2018, p. 223)

Alexia goes to the transit camp and tries to get engage in conversation with refugees
there she finds Tareq who thanks him for saving her sister life. “Thank you so much.
So very much, for help, for my sister” (Abawi, 2018, p. 224). In the evening refugees
from the different nations sit together and share their stories of destruction in their
countries. “As the night progressed, the Syrians and the one Afghan shared their
stories from home…Both volunteers and refugees shed tears…Talk truly is therapy.
Just having someone listen and care can cure so much” (Abawi, 2018, pp. 226–227).

4.10.3 Reconnecting with Others

Third stage of recovery mechanism belongs to reconnecting with others. By

now, the survivor has regained some capacity for trust. Survivor now can have a trust
on others, as they are pretty clear with their vision that to whom they can trust and to
whom they can’t. Survivor now has begun to take more initiatives in his/her life and
he/she is now in the process of creating their new identity. With others now he/she
ready to make deep relationship. In short, the survivor has found the new meaning of
his/her life(Herman, 2002, p. 205).

Tareq develops the cordial relationship with Jamila, an Afghan girl, who
travels with Tareq and Susan when her sister Nadia stranded in the chaos on the Izmir

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coast and shifted to another boat. On reaching Greece Jamila has to leave Tareq in
order to find her stranded sister Nadia. While departing Tareq heart sinks,

Jamila looked at him, her eyes filled with guilt and regret, wondering what she
could have done differently to have remained by Najiba’s side. Tareq detected
other emotions there too, though…But he knew, for now, he had to wait. He
held his heart and his body back. Jamila needs her sister. And I need to take
care of mine.(Abawi, 2018, pp. 212–213)

At the camp Moria, a large camp in Mytilene, from where he and her sister would
finally leave for Germany, he feels a certain urge to meet to Alexia who messages her
on his phone to meet her and her friends at Afghan Hill a place in camp.

Tareq heard the chime of his phone …This time it was a message from the
American girl. She and her friend were here and wanted to see them... He’d
met new people last night that he liked. And he was finally regaining some
hope that things would get better.(Abawi, 2018, pp. 229–230)

4.11 Testimony and Witnessing

Witnessing is one of the most important concepts related to refugee trauma.

Horowitz define witnessing as , “Any form, object or act, serving as evidence or
proof, testimony applies both to the survivors' narratives and the survivors
themselves”(Horowitz, 1992).Felman sees the testimony as a psychoanalytic
dialogue. While Laub’s testimony involves bringing to surface from "the ruins of
memory" something which was never explained before (Horowitz, 1992). Laub even
constructs an ideal listener, who will enable the survivor to share his memory in order
to make the testimony possible. According to him, Survivor’s experiences comprise
over the unconscious memory, which is brought to conscious to make testimony and it
makes the witness for both the survivor and listener (Horowitz, 1992). Felman like
Laubsees testimony as an unknown thing, which is enacted in the process of
testifying. She sets the enactment of testimony in arts and pedagogical practices. Laub
emphasis over the fact that without a listener or a hearer for the victim’s narrative,
trauma can never be known and testimony can never be witnessed. The role of the
witness is given such a central position in the traumatic testimony of the Laub that a

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failure of listening may constitute “a return of the trauma…a re-experiencing of the
event itself ” (Felman & Laub, 1992, p. 67; Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 71).

So, here in our case the narrator, characters, Alexia with her other coworkers
and even the author all get into the act of registering pain and shock of the traumatic
individuals to make our text a valid case of testimony. Text in itself becomes a case of
testimony. Felman and Laub describe literature as testimony. They both consider
literature and psychoanalysis as entangled forms of trauma testimony (Kidd, 2005, pp.
124–125).

Tareq gets shocked on the terrible story of Jamila about his family, killed in
routine visit to the supermarket in Kabul. Here Tareq plays the role of a listener, while
Jamila breaks her silence about her traumatic past giving rise to testimony and
witnessing. Tareq was shocked when he heard about Jamila’s parents and little
brother being killed on a routine trip to the supermarket in Kabul.

They were shopping for food for my birthday. I did not know. It was to be a
surprise. She wiped her eyes. The police said the suicide bomber first shoot
with machine gun at shoppers and store workers. Then he explode his vest. A
big fire burned.” She covered her face as the tears streamed down.(Abawi,
2018, p. 227)

4.12 FINAL SETTLEMENT

Kidd says that the protagonists of the children’s traumatic novel seem to
expose to a subjective splitting, even shattering, from which they must rise to a more
adult self. Tareq defying all the odds reaches Germany and achieves his full maturity
as per the formula of the Buildungsroman novel. He is all shrewd and all wise after
going through so much pain in his life. Alexia notes the same maturity on his face
while she comes to see him off for Germany on port.

He had the face of a pained man, one who had aged in even the short days
since they’d met. She wondered how that face would continue to morph in the
coming weeks, months and years. His trials were far from over. This was just
the beginning.(Abawi, 2018, p. 255)

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Europeans media is continuously portraying refugees as terrorists. Jill Walker and
RadhikaGajjalain their research mention towards the same problem that how the male
Syrian refugees are continuously being portrayed as “Terrorist”, “Infidel Angel” and
“Rapist” on main stream media outlets as well as on social media (Rettberg & Gajjala,
2016). “Smiles were replaced with suspicion. Especially after various traumatizing
incidents in Europe—including the coordinated terror attacks in Paris that killed more
than one hundred people and the horrendous reports of sexual assaults on New Year’s
Eve in various German cities” (Abawi, 2018, p. 268). Borders are being closed on
refugees. “After several more hours, the border finally reopened. Not out of mercy
and kindness, but out of fear of bad press attention in Western Europe” (Abawi, 2018,
p. 260). Traeq at the end the novel talks like a saint when he tries to reconcile with the
European hatred towards the refugees and preaches for the universal brotherhood and
pluralism. “He no longer blamed them for being afraid. He shared their fear. He lived
it...Tareq wished he could tell them, Please don’t be scared of us”(Abawi, 2018, p.
269). But he is happy that he has come out of all the miseries successfully and he is
safe in Germany. “He spent his days at the facility where the German government had
placed him, trying to relax in the absence of soldiers, rebels, Daesh, bullets, shells and
missiles” (Abawi, 2018, p. 269).

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CHAPTER 5

WELCOME TO NOWHERE

5.1 Elizabeth Laird as a Novelist

“I always wanted to be a traveller. A railway line ran pat the garden of my childhood
home, and I used to lie awake listening to the train chug by, wishing I was on one of
them”(Laird, 2014).

Her biographical detail on her own web page goes like this.She was born in
New Zealand in 1943 and her father was a ship’s surgeon and her mother belonged to
Scotland. She is the fourth among the five children to her parents. They started to live
in Britain in 1945.According to her, her first big adventure was to teach in a school in
Malaysia when she was eighteen. She got her university education in Bristol and then
she left for Ethiopia for teaching English in a school. She met to her better half David
McDowall on her tour to India from there they had to move to Iraq because of her
husband transfer, where their first son Angus was born. After that they moved to
Beirut in Lebanon, where civil war was raging. The fighting became so bad there that
they had to evacuated for Vienna where William their second son was born.

According to her they finally decided to take a huge risk in their life by
adopting the profession of writing. Luckily, they had been able to buy a house in
London while they had been working in foreign countries. They came home, and
started writing novels there. Before establishing their self as professional writers they
had to work really hard to make their ends meet. Finally, their books began to sell
well and they never looked back since then (Laird, 2014). She has written many
stories for children and earned a great critical acclaim for them. She has won many
awards including the Children's Book Award. Five times, she has been shortlisted for
the Carnegie Medal for British children's literature. Some of her famous children
books are Shahnameh the Persian Book of Kings, Song of the Dolphin Boy, Kiss the
Dust, Crudaseetc.

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5.2 Welcome to Nowhere: a Short Summary

It is the story of a twelve years old enthusiastic boy Omar, who with all his
brothers and sisters is living in a beauty ancient town Bosra in Syria. Unlike his
disabled brother Musa the “brainbox” and her sister Eman, who wants to be a teacher
in future, he is “useless” in studies but brilliantly bestowed in selling and in future he
wants to be a “big-shot businessman”. His father works for the government in a
tourism office and his mother “Ma” is a house wife. He works like an ant, whole day,
to keep up things steady for him. “What with school and my two jobs, I was busy all
day long, running to keep up” (Laird, 2017). He works in Uncle’s Ali hardware shop
in the early morning then he goes to school till 1 p.m., and finally he goes off to work
at his cousin shop Rasoul. He is saving money under his mattress by selling postcards
strips in order to take the world by storm as a business genius.

While everything was going smoothly, disaster was lurking to wreak havoc in
the Bosra. Protests against the oppressive governments first start in the other Middle
Eastern countries, then the devil takes his turn towards Syria. The civil war comes and
the soldiers can be seen fighting with the protestors on the roads. Tanks roll into the
streets and people are denouncing one another. Now the family has to move to Daraa
to Granny. Omar seems bewildered at the outcome but Musa seems desperate to play
his part against the oppressive regime with the protestors. Eman has his problems as
father is planning her marriage to lessen his burden and to ensure her safety.

Going Darra proves to be going deep into the belly of beast and moving there
means to move into a lot of nasty troubles.“So it’s a great idea, isn’t it, to move us all
to Daraa, into a lot of nasty trouble” (Laird, 2017). They move to Daraa exactly at the
moment when the trouble starts. Anti-government demonstrations, riots and marches
are on rampage. “The tickly smell of tear gas often hung over the city, and from
streets away you could hear the shouts of the marchers: ‘We sacrifice our blood and
our souls! We are no longer afraid! God, Syria, Freedom!”(Laird, 2017).Soon the
bombing starts and one of the shell destroys the Granny’s flat in which the whole
family is staying. To survive the bombing, the family takes refuge in a shed at the
back of the building but soon leaves for the Ma’s sister aunt Fawzia’s house, few
kilometers away from the Daraa.

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 Baba goes back to Daraa, even though Ma begs him not to go but to get his
salary from the ministry he needs to show up at the Agricultural Ministry every day,
where he was working in the Daraa.They spend a few days of respite in the
countryside when trouble starts spreading in the village too.

Trouble was spreading out into the countryside. Every day we heard stories of
rebel raids and government attacks, farms set on fire and roadside bombs. The
picnic by the cistern, only a few weeks ago, seemed to belong to another age.
(Laird, 2017)

It was a time for the family finally to leave the Syria. Baba comes home all panicked
as a suspicion is resting on him being involved with the rebels. “They’ll be coming for
you tomorrow… my friend said…Get out now” (Laird, 2017). They decide to go the
Jordan and Unlce Mahmud takes them to the border crossing on his truck. The
Journey is fraught with unspeakable danger but they finally cross the border from the
river side by the help of two Syrian youngsters.

They are brought to the Za’atari Refugee camp and during the first few weeks family
started falling apart and in Omar’s wordings, “they were at the bottom of the
heap”(Laird, 2017). All of the members seem exhausted and hopeless. Baba being too
nostalgic goes back to work in Daraa with a promise to return. Omar rises to the
occasion and takes charge of all the responsibilities related to his family. He starts
working in the Camp bazaar, The Champs Elysees, on a shop of another Syrian
refugee Abu Radwan. Besides that he remains busy doing all household chores. Soon,
Eman and Musa come out of their shell and restore to life. As for Syrians, happiness
are fleeting and short lived, news of Baba’s death explodes like a bomb shell on the
family. Besides this, Nadia, little sister of Omar, falls extremely ill and needs a heart
surgery in Europe. Camp doctor, Dr. Jean, advises them to migrate to Britain, where
Nadia can get her treatment. Dr.Jean, with the help of the UNHCR, helps them to get
their asylum in Britain. At the end, with a promise of promising life ahead, the whole
family migrates to Britain.

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5.3 Children’s Literature of Atrocity and Picture Books

As a genre Welcome to Nowhere, belongs both to the category of the

Children’s Literature of Atrocity and to Picture Book of trauma. Kenneth Kidd, in his
book Freud in Oz writes that the serious study of children’s literature is said to have
started with Freud. Freud was interested in genre now associated with the children’s
literature, the fairy tale. He informs us that it would not be wrong to proclaim that
psychoanalysis developed in parts through its engagement with the children’s
literature. Psychoanalysis used children’s literature to materialize its themes and
methods, turning first to folklores and fairytales and then to its material development
during the analysis of children’s literary texts (Kidd, 2011, p. vii).

During the 16th and 17th century, children’s literature was being written mainly
for the didactic and moralistic purpose. During the 19th century it was more concerned
with the travels and adventures of the children. All this was written under the genre of
folk and fairy tales. The dominant conception of childhood in this literature was that
of the purity and innocence which this literature sought to be protected. In 20 th
century, the dominant conception of the childhood changed and literature concerning
the children was becoming more realistic and it began to appear as an established
literary genre (Elshaikh, 2017, p. 10). “Subjects previously thought too upsetting for
children are now deemed appropriate and even necessary” (Kidd, 2005, p. 120).

Much realistic literature about the children and adolescents deals with
traumatic experiences like divorce, racism, class struggle, immigration problems,
wars, terrorism, natural disasters etc. (Kidd, 2011, p. 182). Kidd calls this type of
literature as the Literature of Atrocity. Welcome toNowhere, being the novel of
immigration, war and terrorism, thus, clearly qualifies for this genre of Children’s
Literature of Atrocity introduced by Kidd.

Since late 1980’s and early 1990’s, children’s text about trauma has grown
rapidly. Despite the difficulty of representing the true nature of the trauma, there
seems to be consensus now that children’s literature of trauma is the most appropriate
stage to display the trauma works. And the most appropriate genre has been the
Literature of Atrocity. Older children’s literature tends to be about the management of
the trauma while the trauma of atrocity makes deals with its psychological effect

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(Kidd, 2011, p. 182). The children’s literature of atrocity is the only form which
endorses the interactive dynamic of children’s literature and psychoanalysis;
otherwise the children’s literature has always been resistant to open acknowledgment
of trauma (Kidd, 2011, p. 183).

Picturebook as a genre is deeply associated with the emotional and

imaginative lives of children (Kidd, 2011, p. 104). Picturebook offers the most
dramatic form of testimony of trauma. Because of its association with early childhood
and its visual power, this form has a great power to shock and to educate. The high
time for the picturebook as a preferred genre for trauma work seems to have come in
the 1980’s. Cech holds the point that picturebooks must engage with the socio-
political realities of the world, without overly emphasizing on young readers.
Picturebooks are there to equip our children with the political insight and moral
courage to fight against these conditions (Kidd, 2011, p. 197).

Like fairytales and young adult novels, the picturebook has long been attached
with the war and trauma theme. The picturebook is widely considered as the
psychological genre. Galbraith believes that the picturebooks forged in the crucible of
trauma, tend to communicate powerfully with the generations of readers. Picturebook
operates as a secondary or revised survival schema that points to primary survival
schema development in childhood (Kidd, 2011, pp. 197–205). Welcome toNowhere,
being an illustrated novel, illustrated by Lucy Eldricge, is a fine example of
picturebook novel of trauma and testimony.

5.4 Political Disability, Trauma of War and Terrorism

Michelle Balaev in his famous book The Nature of Trauma in American Novel
explains that popular reliance on a single classical model of trauma in literary
criticism over the late two decades has created a limited method of interpretation. This
limited method of trauma according to him has failed to cater the complex phenomena
of trauma in literature(Balaev, 2012, p. 3). According to him this traditional model of
trauma claims trauma as, speechless, unrepresentable, inherently pathologic, timeless
and repetitious (Balaev, 2012, p. 3). He further elaborates his thesis by saying that a
single essentialist or reductionist view that trauma shatters personality and
pathologically divides consciousness has become a popular trope for the scholars to

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explain trauma. According to him these scholars are ascribing universal
characteristics to very intricate phenomena of complex responses. He says that
traditional model of trauma is appealing to the scholars because it allows them to
discuss some of their most cherished notion of severe pain, both somatic and
emotional, caused by external phenomena (Balaev, 2012, p. 23).

He, instead, proposes a pluralistic model of trauma, which in addition to the

trope of trauma fragmentation, gives rise to another notion that trauma may also
disrupt previous formulation of the self and the world (Balaev, 2012, p. 26).
According to him, in novels any extreme event or experience can challenge the
previous formulation of self and identity rather than only demonstrating that the
remembrance of trauma is associated with a single, fixed memory that revisits the
protagonist intermittently (Balaev, 2012, p. 27).

Welcome to Nowhere, as a novel, seems to confirm with the assumptions of

the pluralistic model of trauma. In Welcome to Nowhere, we can clearly identify that
the characters’ relationship with their place and community is the cause of their
trauma rather than to be having an already pathologically divided self.

Both the traumatic event and the process of remembering reorganize the characters’
previous perceptions about self in relation to society and in relation to the natural
world. For example, Omar is not dealing with any prior pathologically divided self,
rather the extreme political events regarding his landscape and community is the
cause of his trauma. Besides this, suffering caused by traumatic events, offer him to
construct the new meanings in such a way that he is no more an infected self rather he
is the one who has some unique and special knowledge and powers that can help
others.

To challenge the traditional model of trauma, which solely focuses on the

individual centered event bound to soma and psyche, Balaev introduces a pluralistic
model of trauma. He was following the footsteps of a psychologist Derek
Summerfield. According to the Summerfiled the Euro-centric model of trauma overly
focuses on individual centered approach, without capturing the importance of cultural
and social traditions. So, there is a need to focus on the concepts of trauma beyond the
Western paradigms, which would include both the individual identity as well as

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individual experience of trauma, especially exposure to war or a natural disaster and
other socio-political factors (Balaev, 2012, pp. 28–29).

In our analysis of the novel Welcome to Nowhere, we will deploy the same
pluralistic model of trauma, in order to find that how the social factors or the social
settings of the novel influences the multiple level of meanings of the traumatic
experience of the characters. Novel opens in the midst of social and political anarchy
and everything seems to be floating out from the memory of the Omar’s mind, who is
remembering his past according to the current needs, fears, desires and wishes against
to the classical model of trauma, which conceptualized memory as an actual trance of
past.

The classical model of trauma characterized memory as involuntary

flashbacks, where a traumatic memory literally returns against the will of the one it
inhabits. “Memory is constructive process not a reduplicative action that merely
reproduces past events…memory is formed by the “interplay” of personal, social and
historical factors” (Balaev, 2012, pp. 30–31). As memory is influenced by variety of
factors, such as individual’s frame of reference (idiosyncratic character traits) and the
shifting social and political context, so it is imperative for our analysis of the novel to
focus solely on these factors.

5.5 Political Crisis and Refugee Movements

According to the UNHCR Syrian emergency webpage, almost 5.6 million people
from the Syria are on the run since the war broke out in the country and about 6.6
million people are those who are internally displaced (“UNHCR Syria emergency,”
n.d.). Bloch and Dona in their book, Forced Migration: Current Issues and Debates,
informs that many millions of international migrants leave their habitual places of
residence due to the multiplicity of reasons which can roughly be divided into three
broad categories known as

 Impoverishment: Which means lack of livelihood opportunity, food

insecurities etc.
 Governance Fragility: State and political fragility.

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 Rights deficit: Religious and ethnic discrimination, generalized violence,
failure of rule of law, human rights depravation (Baloch, 2018, p. 135).

All of these three factors can clearly be seen playing a major role in driving
the plot of the novel throughout the story. Right from the start, novel takes the air
of tension and migration of the characters seems inevitable. From the very first
chapter, there is a sense of ghastly adventure and looming doom. Laird provides
the references of the real life events.

A hastily knowledge of the timeline of the civil war is provided, where in 2011
some of the teenage boys from the Bosra, fired by the idealism of revolution of
Arab spring, in their youthful exuberance write a slogan on the wall, demanding
the oppressive regime of the Assad to withdraw. They were captured and tortured
ruthlessly, triggering the processions and demonstrations that ended in a full
fledge harrowing war. Thus, political crisis lies at the heart of this distressing war
and novel captures all these events in most gruesome and graphical way.

State and political fragility finds its way to the novel right in the very first
chapter when Mr. Nosy warns Uncle Ali about his son, who is a university
student, that he should stay away from getting involved in the politics against the
Syrian Government. “Your son’s at university, isn’t he? ... I hear he’s been
hanging around with the wrong sort… You’d better warn him, Uncle. Tell him to
steer clear of politics. Young hotheads. They need to be taught a lesson” (Laird,
2017).

The whole Middle East seems to be enveloped by the revolts of the Arab Spring,
“Tunisia, Egypt, Libya – trouble blowing up everywhere” (Laird, 2017). Musa,
and his nerd party seem busy in writing anti-government slogans on school walls.
One of them has been caught and tortured.

They’re fifteen. Same age as us… They even wrote their names up on the
walls. Practically suicidal… They’ve tortured the first one they caught… What
did they write that was so bad? ... The people want the regime to change.
(Laird, 2017)

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All of these examples are ample to recognize that why a bulk of people during these
circumstances decide to migrate. Life in Bosra is rapidly changing from an ordinary
and peaceful city to the city of chaos, so the Omar’s family decides to move to some
safe place and for them it isDaraa.But going Daraa is like going deep into the belly of
beast, where situation is not muchdifferent and moving there means moving into a lot
of nasty trouble without knowing it. But, quite ironically, younger ones of the family
are more informed about this situation than the senior ones. So, when Musa reveals
the new of their departure to Daraa on their way back to home from school, he gets
shocked by the news and protest. “We’re moving to Daraa. Baba’s been transferred to
the Ministry of Agriculture. Now, what do you think of that? … The shock had sent
tingles all the way through me…(Laird, 2017, p. 15). On another occasion Omar
criticizes his father’s decision of moving to Daraa mockingly, “So it’s a great idea,
isn’t it, to move us all to Daraa, into a lot of nasty trouble” (Laird, 2017, p. 17). For
Omar, it is all fate that decides bad things for them but he quite ironically and
humorously relates it with the scientific certainty as if he wants to say that more than
a cruel fate it is actually the bad decision making on part of the senior members of the
family that always push them into the jaws of death.

There’s this weird thing about my family. We’re always in the wrong place at
the wrong time. If a meteor was about to fall out of the sky, guess who’d be
standing right where it landed? Yup.Me and my dad and mum and brothers
and sisters. That being a scientific certainty, I suppose it wasn’t surprising that
we moved to Daraa exactly at the moment when the trouble started.(Laird,
2017)

5.6Religious Discrimination, Terrorism and Trauma

“Terror terrorizes when it overwhelms, when it becomes the dominant mode

of relations to the wider world, the prism through which everything else refracts”
(Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 320). Another major factor which plays a hugerole to displace
people from their habitual place of residence is the Terrorism.Religious and ethnic
discrimination often culminate into generalized violence, failure of rule of law, human
rights depravation and their umbrella term terrorism. Trauma associated with the
terrorism, is moreconcerned about how trauma ruptures or damages the previous
notion of identity and the world at the relational level rather than simply focus on the

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individual psyche. Laird portrays her characters in relation to the traumatic events and
tries to capture that how these events affect the identity of the characters. Throughout
the text a council of anarchist revolutionary fighters, to whom Baba, who is strictly on
the side of the government, used to call as rebels or “terrorist”, seem to terrorize the
community with their intermittent shelling and violent shooting. Same is the case with
the Police and Army, who are terrorizing the masses by bombing the residual areas
and by capturing and torturing the revolutionaries. Omar and Musa experience their
trauma open-eyed, when they are caught under the firing exchange between the
military and the revolutionary fighters.

I was nearly at Bassem’s place when I almost ran into a group of gunmen;
checked scarves wrapped round their heads….They’re going to start shelling.
There are resistance fighters everywhere. They’d shoot at a cat if they saw
one… Ma sent me to fetch you… At that moment, shouts from the end of the
street made us turn, and before we had time to take in what was happening, the
crack of a rifle made us flinch…(Laird, 2017)

Trauma and terror ripples outward from a bombing event in Daraa, when both Musa
and Omar are coming back from the Bassem’s house. Bassem is an active young
revolutionary from Daraa, who is the best friend of Musa at school. Both of the guys
are stealthily working for the cause of the revolutionaries.

We had only one more corner to turn before our street, when a shell screamed
deafeningly right over head. At that moment I was absolutely dead certain that
I was going to die, right then and there…I was so stunned with terror that it
took me a second or two (after the massive bang which made the ground shake
under my feet) to realize that I wasn’t dead after all. It took another second to
work out that the shell might have landed on our building and wiped out our
whole family.(Laird, 2017)

The given example is also a fine example of the Elision of Memory. The Elision of a
Memory as explained by Caruth is a term which means that trauma causes loss of
memory for a short period of time and in Freud’s terminology it is known as the
Latency of Trauma.

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 On another place Omar can be seen questioning both to the policies of the
Assad’s government and to the loyalty of his father who is a downright supporter of
an oppressive government, the one who terrorizes its own people.He says,

Is it right for a government to send tanks to terrorize ordinary people (like me)
in our own homes? Baba used to say, ‘Maybe.’ I say, ‘No.’ What do you think
about a government sending in snipers to hide on rooftops and take shots at
people in the streets below? Baba doesn’t say anything. I say, ‘I hate them.’ Is
it OK for a government to send attack helicopters clattering around in the sky,
and to drop huge bombs out of them on to the city below? Even Baba says,
‘No.’ I say, ‘No, no, no.(Laird, 2017)

5.7Trauma of War and Insecurities of Food and livelihood

“Wounds from war are not confined to the battle field. Refugees from conflict zones
….continue to experience trauma…for a long time” (Vargas, 2007, p. 12).

War takes it full toll from the Syrians and millions of them have no choice
except for leaving their home, jobs and businesses. Apart from violence and
persecutions lack of livelihood opportunities and scarcity of food drive millions from
their home to search for the better opportunities in foreign lands.Rasoul, Omar’
cousin, leaves Bosra because he gets tired of the corruption, repression and of the
unending unrest in Syria.

Apart from this his business of the souvenir in the old city of Bosra has almost
closed and there is no hope of betterment as tourist have nearly stopped coming. So,
he decides to migrate to Europe, despites of the visible danger of the journey.

I’m heading to Germany. Or Sweden.Or England. But it’s dangerous! I said

anxiously. I’ve heard about those traffickers. They let you suffocate in the
backs of lorries, and you get drowned in the sea, and… What are you going to
do in Europe? ...Work hard. Save money. Open my own shop. In a year or
two, I’ll send for you. We’ll go into business together.(Laird, 2017)

Prior to the siege of Daraa, Baba and Omar goes out to buy foods item which are
rapidly getting scarce due to war.

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 Only some of the food shops had stayed open, and they were crammed with
people desperately buying everything they could lay their hands on. Some
things had sold out before we could get to them, but we still managed to fill
our bags with stuff like dried lentils, flour, rice, tea, cooking oil, and cheese.
(Laird, 2017)

Chaos reaches to its climax when government started to cutting out the supply of
things without any hope of retrieval. “And then the government shut off the water
supply, too” (Laird, 2017). Hope has started fading out amidst this anarchy and people
have no option except of getting used to all kinds of miseries.

You have to get used to all kinds of things when you’re living in a war. You
forget what it’s like to eat fresh stuff. You stop noticing the burned-out shops,
set on fire by the authorities for daring to go on strike. (Laird, 2017)

5.8Refugee Migration and Trauma of Place

In Welcome to Nowhere, places play a vital role for the formulation of thenew
knowledge of the self and the world around the characters. Characters develop their
self with the changing places. Like our protagonist Omar, when he leaves Bosra, he is
just 12-years-old but within a span of two and a half year, he becomes a very old 14-
year-old Omar.

There are for major places discussed in the novel, Bosra, Daraa, Jordanian Refugee
Camp and Britain. All these four places not only help us to understand the individual
psyche of the characters but they also provide a vivid picture of the circumstances
which finally lead to their trauma and migration.

5.9Bosra a City of Joy and Happiness

Michelle Balaev in his famous book The Nature of Trauma in American Novel
says that trauma is the accumulation of the individual and social forces that gather at a
native place to produce both the meaning of the traumatic experience and the shape
and feel of its remembrance (Balaev, 2012, p. 41). Bosra is the native city of the
family and the favorite one for most of the characters, especially for our protagonist
Omar. Novel opens with Omar’s remark about his hometown, “My hometown is a

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brilliant place”. But soon after saying this he immediatelycorrect himself as he has
committed some heinous mistake, “Was a brilliant place, I suppose I ought to say”.
This remark clearly shows that how hard it is for the refugees to efface the memories
of the native land from their mind and the pain associated with it. It continues to haunt
themforever. Besides this it continues to shape their identity and the meaning of the
world around them relative to the other lands which they visit during their
journey.Omar provides further details about the whereabouts of the city, and we can
easily imagine that how beautiful the city actually was. Omar says that it’s small town
so you can never get lot in it. Right in the middle of the town there is a huge
tumbledown city of the Roman ruins “whole streets, temples, a theatre, you name it.”
And city has been a greattourist’s attraction forever. “Tourists used to come from all
over the world to see Bosra.” But nobody knows that what disaster is actually in store
for this city as Omar says, “Nobody saw the disaster coming, especially not me.”

Riots, demonstrations and processions and all such small skirmishes give rise to a full
fledge civil war, thus making difficult for the people to survive in such environment.
So, family decides to leave for seemingly a good place Daraa. “Looking back now,
those days in Bosra seem like a sort of dream. Everything was ordinary and
peaceful”(Laird, 2017, p. 10).

5.10Daraa a City of Chaos

“ Traumatic experience is situated within the contexts of immigration…

creating alternative meanings and states of subjectivity for the protagonist” (Balaev,
2012, p. 41).

Omar’s family at first displaces internally to Daraa, Baba’s home town, but the
decision proves to be pathetic. Daraa seems to be all chaos, being the centre of the
civil war. And the family seems clearly “in the wrong place at the wrong time”. And
finally they can do nothing but to mourn and feel scornful about the poor decision
making of Baba, who has blinded by his idea of favoring government in all the
matters. “I was fed up…and with Baba for bringing us to this dump, and with Daraa
itself. I felt as if the whole world was against me” (Laird, 2017, p. 31). Civil war has
wreaked havoc in the city and badly shattered the normal way of life of the citizens;
Omar describes this feeling in a most poignant way.

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 Daraa was such an ordinary place when we first went to live there. The
pavements were crowded with shoppers, the streets were full of traffic, and
there were all the usual things that make up a city – shops, schools, hospitals,
mosques, churches – but a few months later it was all wrecked. Ruined. Dead.
(Laird, 2017, p. 45)

Omar’s family has to face a lot of nasty things during their stay in Daraa. There are
processions and demonstrations, face to face skirmishes between the military and the
government, tanks rolling into the streets, bombing and much more.All these things
are enough to terrorize our protagonist, who is just 12 years old.

That day, when the siege of Daraa began, was when the knots in my stomach
began to tighten up. It was the day when I started to feel truly afraid. And that
night, and for nights after, I couldn’t get to sleep, and when I did drop off, I
had terrible dreams.(Laird, 2017, p. 48)

Which is the exact definition of trauma as told by Herman, “The traumatized person
startles easily, reacts irritably to small provocations, and sleeps poorly” (Herman,
2015, p. 35). So, finally when family feels that, “We’re finished here”, Ma wants to
go back to Bosra. But there is no way back as father retorts to Ma, “there’ll be
fighting and shelling in Bosra too.” So, they decide to move towards the country side
on Ma’s suggestion, “Not in the countryside, where my sister’s family lives”.

5.11Countryside, the Last Connection with Syria

“The landscape provides a referential framework for the protagonist to understand the
self because the land contains historical and cultural valence” (Balaev, 2012, p. 46).

Family gets out of Daraa just at the right time when the shelling starts. Everyone is
leaving the city and everyone seems to be on move. Finally, they reach to aunt’s
farmhouse and Auntie Fawzia and Unlce Mahmud receives them with open heart. The
countryside proves to be one last connection of family with their native environment.
The landscape of the countryside provides a referential framework for Omar to
recognize himself in a new way because previously he prefers himself to be called as
a town or city living guy and not a country boy. “I”ll never be a farmer”. It is a last
chance for him, given by the nature, to associate himself strongly with the native land

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and to learn the native way of life prior to his migration to a foreign land. During his
days in countryside he learns a lot about the native way of life of the Syrian people.

The conceptual orientation of positioning him and his family close to land suggests
that identity is formed by and through a relation to place. Omar reconstitutes his
identity by learning the way of his native culture. For example, he learns that how the
native people of Syria attire them self and how they look like by seeing Uncle
Mahmud.

Uncle Mahmud’s face was brown and leathery from working out of doors in
the sun. He was in his working clothes, a long grey tunic hitched up with a belt
to keep his legs free, and a red keffiyeh wrapped round his head. (Laird, 2017,
p. 65)

This re-orientation of position helps Omar to cope with his previous traumatic
experiences which he has faced in Darra. Erikson explains the same point as, One of
the crucial tasks of culture is to lessen or mitigate the actual risks (Caruth, 1995, p.
194).

Omar’s toilsome work of picking up stones in the field, in order to make it clear for
the cultivation, with Uncle’s Mahmud and Jaber provides him a chance to restore his
connection not only with his own self but also with the Syrian soil, which he was
missing due to his traumatic experiences in Daraa. The whole family seems to be
returning back from the past traumas and Syrian cuisines are proving to be the
catalysts in the process.

It might sound as if I’m really shallow, but probably the thing I liked most
about being on the farm was the food. Auntie Fawzia was a brilliant cook. She
and Ma and Granny sat together for hours in the afternoons, on a mat outside
the kitchen door, sorting through pans of dried lentils…Then they’d get into
the kitchen and the loveliest smells would come wafting out, and at dinner
time we’d sit down to eat stuffed cabbage leaves with pomegranate sauce, and
minced lamb with spinach and wedges of lemon, and fresh eggs, and beautiful
bread, hot from the oven. (Laird, 2017, p. 69)

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Laird’s depicts the sublime landscape imagery in bright colors, because she is writing
for the children, in order to reflect the soul of the country, which in turn reflects the
soul of the Syrian people and of Omar. The whole family one day goes for the picnic
and Omar relates the paradisiacal beauty of the country side.

As I remember it, there was something golden about that afternoon. A light
breeze stirred the still-green leaves of the grove of fig and olive trees. The
cistern was nearly empty now, but frogs still plopped occasionally in the
shallow water…a rush of love for all my family… it was as if I was noticing
things I’d never noticed before.(Laird, 2017, p. 75)

Some of the time Omar fall a prey to his intermittent visits of trauma. But serene and
trance like environment of the countryside always numbs it effectively without
causing any harm.

I suppose Baba’s right, I told myself uncertainly. Eman can’t be a teacher

now, so she ought to get married…The thought of what would happen to my
sister if rampaging soldiers stormed the farm was so terrifying that it kept me
awake sometimes, even though I was always worn out from the day’s work.
(Laird, 2017, p. 74)

Serenity proves to be short lived and Omar’s fears get manifestation with the little
skirmishes start spreading in the village too.

They’ve gone, he said. ‘The rebels.’ ‘Who were they? What happened? Is
anyone dead?’ we all asked him at once. Uncle Mahmud’s unwillingness to
speak had never been more irritating. ‘Four or five rebels only,’ he said.
Targeted killing.Two policemen. Shot lots of rounds. They hit a baby as well.
Ricochet through a window.(Laird, 2017, p. 83)

Baba comes back from Daraa, as he was still there for his work in Ministry, all
horrified and implores the family to leave the place as soon as possible. A suspicion is
resting upon him for being a rebel. All the family leaves the village with the help of
Uncle Ali, who helps them to reach near to the border of Jordon.

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5.12Jordanian Syrian Refugee Camp and Settlement in Transit

Refugee camp landscape represents a place of political refuge. It is free from

war, yet the land functions as a reminder of the life which the family has left behind.
It also functions as a reminder of their limits of freedom in the camp territory. And
when everyone fails to cope with the new problems of the camp life, only Omar
shines with his extraordinary resilient qualities. Omar shows utmost level of agency in
the wake of miseries and comes out from all his miseries as a mature and wise being.
So, he is continuously redefining and re-evaluating his personality in relation to his
changingcircumstances and places. From the very first week in the camp, Omar stand
out from all in bravery and the amount of courage. Omar points to several problems
they have to face in the refugees camp, ranging from shifting in tents, getting meal,
fetching water, extreme weather conditions, getting education to many more. But
despite of all these difficulties they sustain the conditions and it is just because of him.

Omer sketches a vivid picture of the distressing life of the refugee camp, when
he first enters the camp. So, we as readers experience all those things what he
experiences first hand. For examples, he shares his feelings while entering the camp
for first time like this.

My stupid dream of a nice hotel and a wonderful meal faded away like a light
going out as I looked round… I stood in a daze, looking round…This is what I
saw: long rows of dingy white tents, stretching into the distance, set on a flat,
gritty, yellow desert, dazzlingly bright in the morning sun. There were
European letters in blue writing on every tent… Unhcr…United Nations High
Commission for Refugees.(Laird, 2017, p. 100)

Omar has his own definition of being refugee and his definition is based on his own
experience, which has no alternative whatsoever.

You realize, when you become a refugee, that there’s no hurry any more. You
might not be about to die from a shell blasting through the walls of your
house, or a from barrel bomb falling from the sky, but you might easily die of
boredom...(Laird, 2017, p. 101)

He further explains about refugee identity like this,

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 You have to stand about in line, waiting for someone to ask you a million
questions and then give you a card which tells you that you’re a nobody now.
You don’t belong anywhere anymore. No one wants you. You have to wait in
other lines, lots of them, until someone gives you a disgusting meal, which is
supposed to be hot but isn’t, in a greasy pizza box. (Laird, 2017, p. 101)

His explanation about the quality of food is even distressing,

We sat down and opened the food boxes. We were all starving by now. ‘They
call this food?’ said Ma, poking at a dried-up bit of chicken with a disgusted
finger… I was so hungry by then that I would have eaten a bowlful of mouldy
rice. The meal wasn’t that bad, but it wasn’t nice, either. The rice was soggy,
the chicken was as tough as leather, and the vegetables were squashy and
tasteless. The best things were the hunks of bread. (Laird, 2017, p. 102)

He further goes on to explains the extreme weather conditions of the camp, which are
equally distressing like all the other things which he has explained.

But no one could ever get used toliving in a tent in the middle of a desert with
the winter coming on. By the end of October, it was so cold at night that we
lay shivering under our thin UN blankets, even though we’d piledall our
clothes on top of ourselves. (Laird, 2017, p. 104)

All of these examples are enough for the realization of the fact by the readers
that the life of a refugee is extremely tough in those refugees’ tents. But when things
become that much harder even a little respite fills you with incomparable happiness.
Same happen when the family at last shifts from tent to a cabin.

It was wonderful moving from the tent to the cabin. It felt like a step out of
misery into…well, into something just a bit better. Although we had a heater,
which made the evenings more bearable, we still had no electricity. It was now
the end of November and getting dark earlier all the time. It was horrible
without proper light in the evenings. But we were dry, and warmer, and able to
keep reasonably clean. (Laird, 2017, p. 106)

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Van der Kolk, a psychologist, also points towards the same familial problems of the
refugees in a new place of settlement. She says, as a primary social structure of the
refugee community, family is bound to provide the feeding, clothing and other
primary needs to its members. Family tasks like these become difficult to carry on
after migration..lack of family support frequently leads towards confusion..(Van der
Kolk et al., 1996, p. 232).In our case it is basically Omar, who is keeping the family
intact despite of his younger age. That’s the reason when Baba goes back to Daraa to
settle his case with government, he clearly reckons Omar as the head of the family in
his place. He says, “I’m relying on you, Omar. Support your mother. Look after Eman
and the little ones” (Laird, 2017, p. 116). Even Omar himself is familiar with this fact
that he doesn’t require anyone help to steer clear his way through austerity. He has
grown to his full maturity, which he lacks previously.

He is able to find a job for himself at Champs Elysees, Camp Market, in order
to cope with the financial problem of his family, while the boys of his age are busy in
stealing and creating the fuss around in the camp. He helps Musa to come out of the
jail of the family’s cabin, by deploying Hooligans, a gang of young violent children,
in his service and protection, so that he can take Fuad, their younger brother, to
school. He even helps Riad, the leader of the Hooligans, prior moving to Britain to
find his “reformed character”. And that is the vigor of his character, that he modifies
himself with the changing places and situation. He becomes used to almost every
situation and that is the beauty of his character.

Most people in the camp seemed to be bored to death, but I was busy all day
long….after the first week without Baba, I didn’t miss him much. Every now
and then a text …I stopped thinking about him. I was getting used to taking
decisions and sorting things out on my own.(Laird, 2017, p. 121)

5.13Britain the Promised land

Britain in the novel is depicted as the Promised Land, The land of utmost
happiness and joy. A land which has thousand promises to obey and which is
supposed to provide a solace to the wounded hearts. It’s a place where Nadia, the little
sister of Omar, is going to be treated for her heart problem as told by Dr, Jean in the
camp hospital. It’s also a place, which Omar thought of as “exciting, but scary

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too”.For Musa, it’s a place where he will become the professor of the political science
but besides that he has his reservations too, “But in England we’d just be a bunch of
refugees…”. For Faud, it’s a place where he is taking all his drawings with him
including the one in which “a tank with a streak of yellow light coming out of the
barrel and people lying in front of it in pools of red” (Laird, 2017, p. 147). For Eman,
it’s place of her liberty where she will ‘be free from Patriarchy. Thus, Landscape
provides a referential framework for the characters to understand the self.

5.14Technology, the Road to Resilience or Propaganda

Technology plays a very vital role in shaping the trajectory of the plot in this
novel. Novel is replete with examples where technology is being used both as a tool
of agency as well as propaganda. Jacques Derrida named this aspect of technology as
pharmakon: “it is both poison and remedy, needing to be administered in controlled
dosages to produce desired effects, otherwise it becomes dangerous like an illicit
drug” (John Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 169). Televisions are becoming the biggest source
of spreading the cultural trauma narrative among the masses. “It’s all over the TV.
Huge anti- government demonstrations in Daraa! Criminal rioters and undesirable
elements on the rampage!” (Laird, 2017, p. 30). Today, with the help of Digital
Media, events can instantaneously be transmitted through networks around the globe.
Digital media allows the marginalized or repressed class to build their alternate
traumatic narrative that helps them recruit new members and calls for an immediate
political action (John Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 169).

In our case, Musa, the elder brother of the Omar, seemingly a dumbhead
cripple, as he is struggling with cerebral palsy, knows very well about this power of
the Digital media. Being a “brainbox”, he can be seen almost throughout the novel as
a shrewd exploiter of the digital technology for his purpose. He seems keen to play his
part as a revolutionary. He stealthy works for the school nerds, activists, who remain
busy writing anti-government slogans on walls and organizing subversive activities
online in order to generate a separate traumatic narrative. Being a genius in studies
and a cripple, he has given the difficult responsibility of serving his part as an internet
and technological geek. He along with two other nerds plans to watch the activities of
the government on internet so that they can find the way to subvert them.

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 Ismail’s father has a very powerful computer, Musa went on. And an
unusually good broadband connection. He lets Ismail use it in the afternoons.
Who’s going to suspect us of doing anything subversive – two nerds and a
cripple? We’ve been researching what our dear government has been up to.
(Laird, 2017, p. 26)

Roger Kurtz, talks about the witnessing of the recorded testimony with regard to the
trauma theory as,

On internet and social media videos go viral, without any predictable end…
trauma theory have place a particular stress on witnessing of recorded
testimony...trauma is transferred from the body of survivor to the larger
community…this transmission of trauma to a community of witnesses through
media is known as a one source-to-many receivers model of communication.
(John Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 169)

Musa is familiar with this end of the media usage that is the reason he risks his life
while filming the riot between government and revolutionaries in Daraa.

That was when I caught sight of Musa. My brother, my idiotic brother, who
had been on the outside of the march, was hobbling along the pavement
towards me, holding his precious new phone up infront of his face. He was
filming the whole thing. The troops opened fire again, straight into the crowd.
More men and boys were falling, bright splashes of scarlet spreading over
their clothes. (Laird, 2017, p. 32)

This is also a very fine example of Musa’s agency in the face of an oppressive
structure. According to Allen Meer, television has always remained a source of
centrally controlled transmission where everyone is bound to see the same images and
hear the same stories (John Roger Kurtz, 2018, p. 168). Governments decide that what
is to be shown and is to be transmitted. Syrian government is also doing the same.
“And then the TV would butt in with the voice of our President, droning on about
‘foreign powers’, ‘conspiracies’, and Syria going through ‘a test of unity’”(Laird,
2017, p. 48).

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 Omar once calls the mobile phone of Musa as “little stick of revolutionary
dynamite”; he himself is well aware of the power this little device has in store, “filled
with who knew what films and photos and incriminating messages”, a recorded
testimony for witnessing. According to Dona and Baloch,“People on the move use
mobile phones to connect, stay in touch and reconnect. Smartphones have become the
‘network capital’ that enables transit migrants to communicate with families and
friends as well as other migrants on the move” (Baloch, 2018, p. 493). Throughout the
novel mobile phone remains a biggest source of connection between the family
members. Mobile phones provide a virtual space where the deserted members of the
family and friends can reconnect. Rasoul, Omar’s cousin, who is undertaking a
dangerous journey to Europe, has no other source available to connectwith Omar
except mobile phone. “Rasoul was progressing on his dangerous journey to Europe.
He hadn’t come to say goodbye to us as he’d promised. All I’d had was a text
message to say that his chance had come up and he’d got on a flight to Turkey”
(Laird, 2017, p. 29). In Baba’s absence, mobile phone remains the only hope for the
family to make sure if he is alright or not. “I didn’t miss him much. Every now and
then a text would come to Ma, so that we knew he was all right” (Laird, 2017, p. 121).

Becoming unresponsive on this virtual place means the connection has lost
and the individual is in danger. “At first, when Ma started panicking about Baba, I
didn’t listen. A week passed without a text from him. Two weeks went by. Then
three” (Laird, 2017, p. 126). According to MarenBorkert, Karen E.Fisher and
EiadYafi, The everlasting presence of digital technologies affect all aspects of a
migrant’s experience both before entry to post-arrival… (Borkert, Fisher, & Yafi,
2018, p. 3).During their stay in camp, Musa and Omar pay lot of attention to their
technological needs. Omar often pays visit to an electrical shop in The Champs
Elysees, in order to charge the family gadgets, so that they can stay connected with
others.

We reached the electrical store at last. High above it was a hoarding made out
of a section of caravan wall, with the word ‘Phones’ painted on it, and logos
for internet and phone connections…. Please, Uncle, I said. Can you charge
them for me?(Laird, 2017, p. 108).

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Carleen Maitland, an associate professor at college of IST of Penn State, conducteda
case study research on the use of mobile phone and about the communication
behavior of the refugees at the Za’atari Camp. Maitland says that mobile phone and
internet use among the refugees in Za’atari Camp is greater than when they were in
Syria. According to her, 52% of the Refugees were using the internet via mobile
phones while living in Syria, while the number of users has dramatically increased in
the Za’atari Camp, reaches to 69% via mobile phones (Maitland, 2015, 2016). She
further explains that camp economy consists of the food and non-food items provide
by the UNHCR for free, while the internet service is not provided by the UNHCR, as
it is not a life sustaining need of the refugees. According to her, Refugees earn money
in order to pay for the mobile technology. She further explains that camp hosts
approximately 3000 refugee-owned shops which generate 10 million Euros a month.
Retailers of the phones, batteries and SIM cards are among these shops (Maitland,
2015, 2016). Laird draws an exact picture of the Za’atari Camp in this novel. The
Champs Elysees is also an exact depiction of the market told by Maitland in her
research. For another resemblance we can take the example of our protagonist Omar,
who sells batteries in the camp in order to generate some finance to support his
family.Maitland, also praises the refugees for their resilient behavior. According to
Maitland, despite of the dire conditions, which many refugees are facing, these
refugees exhibit a vibrant and resilient behavior.

According to her the children are formally educated and they are capable of
receiving the Jordanian High School Diploma(Koons, 2015). Maitland survey shows
that about 86 percent of the youth have their own mobile phones and 50 percent of
them use internet at least once a day(Koons, 2015). Laird depiction of Musa as an
educated and resilient character, the one who exhibit utter resiliency in technology
use, is an exact interpretation of the Syrian youth in Za’atari Camp. At the end of the
novel, Musa through the use of the internet and computer saves his sister Eman from
her perpetual doom. Mr. Nosy the fiancé of the Eman come all the way to camp from
Syria to take Eman away as his rightful wife, as their marriage has already been fixed
in Syria by Baba. Musa, quite heroically digs out all of his criminal and identity
records from internet. Records reveal him as a convicted rapist and Nosy has to leave
the camp in dismay. Thus, technologies are not mere accessories in the hands of
refugees rather they are essential life saving tools.

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You – are – not – going – to – marry – my – sister…Omar, fetch my laptop…
Your full name, it’s Bilal Maher, isn’t it?’ Musa was saying. You know it is.
Bilal was getting angry.And you lived in Duma, near Damascus, six years
ago? You were working in a bicycle store? ... I’ve downloaded the bit we need
to look at…The crime is detailed here. Musa jabbed a finger at the screen.
Rape.A nasty case. You nearly killed the poor girl. (Laird, 2017, p. 132)

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CHAPTER 6

Conclusion

From The last few years, there has been a trend in literary studies of the
publication of a number of migration based novels. An ever growing number of
contemporary writers are writing about the most recently displaced refugees,
displaced due to the war and political conflicts in their respective countries. Present
research has been conducted to analyze two similar migration based novels Welcome
to Nowhere and A land of Permanent Goodbyes. Both of these novelsthematize the
Syrian refugee migration across the Syrian borderline as a subject. Andboth novels
draw a clear picture of the harrowing journey of the refugee characters in a unique
way. The focus of analysis of this research has been to find out the effects of
migration based trauma on the characters' psyche. Literary Trauma Theory has been
used to demonstratehow psychological trauma influences the life of the characters
during and after the migration. Apart from this Theory of Resilience has also been
used to record the instances of resilience posed by the refugee characters in the face of
adversity. Special focus has been given to the analysis of the children characters as
both of our novels pertain to the genre of Children’s Literature.

It has been found during our research that a wide range of traumatic
experiences have been presented in both of our novels, which could be identified both
by the traditional trauma theory as well as the non-western or pluralistic model of
literary trauma theory.Place and setting are considered as two most important factors
in shaping the plot of the novels. Therefore, both of our novels pay a special focus on
the social, cultural and political aspects of the psychological trauma.

A Land of Permanent Goodbyes,is fine example of both the migration based

text as well as the trauma novel, where trauma arises due to the force migration of the
refugee characters. Abawi portrays her ProtagonistTareq as dealing with a powerful
stimulus from outside, here destruction of the social and familial structure due to war
and exodus from the homeland Syria, for which he has no control and no power to
resist it. As a result he falls a prey to trauma, and shows all the symptoms of a
traumatized individual as explained by the classical or traditional model of trauma. He
can be seen dealing with nightmares of bombing, flashbacks of the scene of his
94
bombed out apartment in Syria, sleeplessness and above all the unspeakabilityof his
fright, as according to the traditional model, trauma is considered as unspeakable. The
protagonist acts out the trauma exactly the same way as defined by the Caruth, in a
repetitive behavior and nightmares. Talking cure and abreaction, alongside with other
resiliency approaches, is adopted by him to work through his trauma in the transit
camp of Turkey. Apart from this individualistic explanation of the trauma, novel also
depicts a collective trauma of the whole community in the backdrop of the socio-
political conflicts of the Syria. As a genre, novel clearly falls under the category of
Buildungsroman novel.

Welcome to Nowhere, is also fine example of the migratory text, where

theme of migration is explored under the backdrop ofBalaevTheory of pluralism or
pluralistic model of trauma. Novel is narrated by a twelve years old protagonist Omar
and this very thing makes the novel very different from the other migration based
novels. We like Omar for both his naivety as well as for his maturity, as Laird
combines the childish naivety with the maturity of a shrewd observer in Omar’s
character. Trauma, being purely a pluralistic in form, arises due to the change in the
setting and places. It can clearly be observed that In Welcome to Nowhere characters’
relationship with their place and community is the cause of their trauma rather than to
be having an already pathologically divided self. Both the traumatic event and the
process of remembering reorganize the characters’ previous perceptions about self in
relation to society and in relation to the natural world. Besides this, suffering caused
by traumatic events, offer him to construct the new meanings in such a way that he is
no more an infected self rather he is the one who has some unique and special
knowledge and powers that can help others. Technology is used effectively both for
the purpose of registering testimony as well as for posing agency towards the
oppressive force. As a genre, novel clearly falls under the category of Children’s
Literature of Atrocity and Picturebook form of literature.

At the end, it is evident that both of our novels are clearly the migration based
novels, where trauma plays a vital role in shaping the identity and life of the
characters. It is evident that all of our characters, especially our protagonists, pose a
sufficient amount of agency in the wake of adversity. And above all, both of these
novels successfully capture the exact mental and visual imagery of the refugees’

95
experiences, that would increase understanding and empathy among the young
readers.

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