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Gestures of Testimony
Torture, Trauma, and Affect in Literature
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Gestures of Testimony
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Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?
This work suits readers interested in contemporary literature, cultural theory, human rights, ethics, and those seeking a profound understanding of trauma and testimony in post-9/11 contexts.
Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and
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Description
After 9/11, the United States became a nation that sanctioned torture. Detainees across the globe were waterboarded, deprived of sleep, beaten by guards, blasted with deafening music, and forced into obscene acts. Their torture presents a profound problem for literature: torturous pain and its traumatic aftermath have long been held to destroy language, shatter experience, and refuse representation. Challenging accepted thinking, Gestures of Testimony asks how literature might bear witness to the tortures of a war waged against fear itself.
Bringing the vibrant field of affect theory to bear on theories of torture and power, Richardson adopts an interdisciplinary approach to show how testimony founded in affect can bear witness to torture and its traumas. Grounded in provocative readings of poems by Guantanamo detainees, memoirs of interrogators and detainees, contemporary films, the Bush Administration’s Torture Memos, and fiction by George Orwell, Franz Kafka, Arthur Koestler, Anne Michaels, and Janette Turner Hospital, Michael Richardson traces the workings of affect, biopower, and aesthetics to re-think literary testimony.
Gestures of Testimony gives shape to a mode of affective witnessing, a reaching beyond the page in the writing of torture that reveals violent trauma — even as it embodies its veiling.
Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?
Gestures of Testimony is praised for its insightful and sometimes wrenching analysis of torture representations, from Kafka's work to the Bush Administration's Torture Memos. According to James Dawes, it is an important contribution to ethics, aesthetics, and human rights. The book expertly navigates literature, media, cinema, official documents, and philosophy to address the challenge of bearing witness to trauma that seems beyond representation.
Book Details
INFORMATION
ISBN: 9781501339400
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Format: Paperback / softback
Date Published: 25 January 2018
Country: United States
Imprint: Bloomsbury Academic
Illustration: 12 b/w illustrations
Audience: Tertiary education
DIMENSIONS
Width: 152.0mm
Height: 229.0mm
Weight: 318g
Pages: 232
Collections
About the Author
Michael Richardson is Lecturer in the School of Arts & Media at the University of New South Wales, Australia.
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