Description
Book SynopsisEmpathy and the Phantasmic in Ethnic American Trauma Narratives examines a burgeoning genre of ethnic American literature called phantasmic trauma narratives, which use culturally specific modes of the supernatural to connect readers to historical traumas such as slavery and genocide. Drawing on trauma theory and using an ethnic studies methodology, this book shows how phantasmic novels and films present historical trauma in ways that seek to invite reader/viewer empathy about the cultural groups represented. In so doing, the author argues that these texts also provide models of interracial alliances to encourage contemporary cross-cultural engagement as a restorative response to historical traumas. Further, the author examines how these narratives function as sites of cultural memory that provide a critical purchase on the enormity of enslavement, genocide, and dispossession.
Trade ReviewEmpathy and the Phantasmic in Ethnic American Trauma Narratives is a smart and timely book that raises vital questions about the haunting effects of traumatic memory on cultures and individuals. In her sensitive reading of multi-ethnic, cross-cultural representations of the 'other' in literature and film, Setka makes claims for the ways in which inherited trauma and legacies of rupture, disruption, and loss transcend temporality, collapsing past, present, and future. This is an important book that comes at a critical time in global history, one in which social and political institutions bear the weight of competing traumatic histories. In unpacking the layers of memory and trauma, Setka ultimately makes imperative the capacity for empathy and for ethical witnessing.
-- Victoria Aarons, Distinguished Professor of Literature, Trinity University
Table of ContentsIntroduction: Phantasmic Trauma Narratives
Chapter 1: Phantasmic Africanisms: Igbo Cosmology in Octavia Butler’s Kindred
Chapter 2: Phantasmic Midrashim: The Midrashic Roots of Jonathan Safran Foer’s Everything is Illuminated
Chapter 3: A Phantasmic Tribalography: The Case of LeAnne Howe’s Miko Kings: An Indian Baseball Story
Chapter 4: Projecting the Phantasmic
Conclusion: The Call to Infinite Responsibility
