Narrating marginalisation: identity, violence, and trauma in selected texts from East Africa

Abstract

The study examined the processes of othering in seven selected texts from East Africa: Ebrahim Hussein’s Kinjeketile (1969), Abdurazak Gurnah’s Afterlives (2020), Emmanuel Jal’s War Child (2009), Kinyanjui Kombani’s The Last Villains of Molo (2004), Gil Courtemanche’s A Sunday at the Pool in Kigali (2000), Gael Faye’s Small Country (2016), and John Ruganda’s Shreds of Tenderness (2001) to determine how violence is used not only as a tool to subjugate groups but also as a means through which the subjugated groups are traumatised and challenge marginalisation. The study also analysed violence-induced trauma and its impact on the characters as well as how authors give agency to the marginalised victims of violence and trauma in the texts. The texts were purposively selected based on their representation of marginalisation, violence, and trauma across the East African region. The study highlights the importance of literature in representing experience and its role in fostering dialogue on ‘otherness’ and marginalisation. It employed Edward Said’s post-colonial theory of ‘the Other’ and Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory in its discourse analysis. Said’s concept of ‘the Other’ as outlined in Orientalism is extended to examine how stereotypes and half-truths constructed by dominant groups foster a culture of violence through the marginalisation of other groups. Freud’s ‘Uncanny’ is instrumental in exploring trauma as a consequence of violence affecting the characters within the texts. The study utilised a qualitative approach, involving close textual analysis of the primary texts to investigate how violence, trauma, and notions of identity are constructed and represented. To achieve this, it examined narrative strategies used to portray marginalisation, violence, and trauma. The findings indicated that dominant groups assert their power by subjugating subordinate groups. This subjugation occurs through the degradation of the language of the “subordinates”, thereby ascribing inferiority to both their language and to themselves. While violence is used as a tool for marginalisation, marginalised groups can also utilise it to contest their oppression. The marginalisation and violence lead to trauma. The study concluded that literature does not merely aim to depict experience but also to evoke reflection. Therefore, while literary works depict real-life moments, they offer alternative perspectives for understanding these situations and provide a platform where both characters and readers can re-experience the events and confront the resulting trauma. Although the study established a direct link between marginalisation, violence, and trauma, it recommends further research on whether there is a possibility for the marginalised to negotiate for space without resorting to violence.