The Culture of Trauma and the writing of History
Date and Time
Considering the extraordinary current implantation and popularity of the notion of (psychic) trauma, the talk will offer a comprehensive approach to its complex conceptual history, its broad cultural coordinates, and its significant historiographical appropriations. First, it will synthetically outline the crystallization and development of the doctrine of trauma in clinical psychiatry, psychopathology, and psychoanalysis. It will then address its revealing insertion into an order of sensibility and values derived from the preferred forms of subjectivation and the main attributes of contemporary citizenship. Finally, it will present the (problematic) translational concept of cultural (and/or historical) trauma and make some concluding remarks on the constitutive link between the culture of trauma and the culture of memory.
Speaker: Enric Novella (Coordinador del Programa Interuniversitari de Doctorat en Estudis Històrics i Socials sobre Ciència, Medicina i Comunicació Científica (UV/UMH/UA)).
Sponsors: RCCHU; Harvard University; University of Valencia.