Abstract
If “narrative” implies a form of discourse in which sequencedevents are meaningfully connected, an “anti-narrative” is achaotic discourse form “of time without sequence, telling withoutmediation, and speaking about oneself without being fully able toreflect on oneself” (Frank 1995: 98). This paper examinesnarratives and anti-narratives in the oral discourses ofsurvivors of the Cambodian killing fields. Through an extendedanalysis of two cases, we demonstrate the internal logic and “eloquence” of anti-narratives – i.e., the ways in whichanti-narrative patterns vividly express and reveal a survivor'scomplex and continuing experience of atrocity.
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Uehara, E.S., Farris, M., Morelli, P.T. et al. 'Eloquent Chaos' in the Oral Discourse of Killing Fields Survivors: An Exploration of Atrocity and Narrativization. Cult Med Psychiatry 25, 29–61 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005606014694
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005606014694