Description
Book SynopsisThis demonstrates how the Doukhobors employed both “classic” and alternative forms of autobiography to communicate their views about communal living, vegetarianism, activism, and spiritual life, as well as to pass on traditions to successive generations.
Trade ReviewWhat Rak has written is a serious and worthwhile addition to our understanding of the way a marginalized people struggles, against all those social currents that would silence them, to find and honour a collective autobiographical voice. -- Myler Wilkinson, Selkirk College * BC Studies, Spring 2005 *
In her methodologically ground-breaking book,
Negotiated Memory, Julie Rak uses autobiographical discourse (as opposed to autobiographical genre), cultural context, and historical narrative to theorize about the relationships among the meanings of identity, place and nation…However, the book is much more than an innovative use of autobiographical discourse as a post-colonial tool useful in studying powerless groups.
Negotiated Memory is also a rich cultural history of the migration and adaptation experiences of an often misunderstood religious group. -- Susan W. Hardwick, Department of Geography, University of Oregon * American Review of Canadian Studies, Autumn 2005 *
This will be a useful and informative text for students of Canadian studies, as well as those interested in critical autobiography and identity theory ... Rak does a very good job of navigating the complex topography of Doukhobor autobiographical discourse within the Canadian historical landscape. -- Vicki S. Hallett * University of Toronto Quarterly, vol. 75, no. 1, Winter 2006 *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments
Introduction
1 Beyond Auto-Bio-Graphe: Autobiography and Alternative Identities
2 Doukhobor Beliefs and Historical Moments
3 Vechnaiia Pamit in the Diaspora: Community Meanings of History and Migration
4 Negotiating Identity: Doukhobor Oral Narratives
5 Witness, Negotiation, Performance: Freedomite Autobiography
Conclusion: Negotiating the “I” and “We” in Autobiography
Notes
References
Index
