This dissertation explores the recollection of historical memory in a number of significant literary and cinematic texts produced during the first thirty years of the Francoist
dictatorship. Ironically, the first quarter-century of post-war Spain was referred to as "los años de la paz" [The Peaceful Years] by the propagandistic effort of the regime. However, as
my dissertation will show, representative texts of the same period articulate trauma that was still lingering in collective memory. Contrary to the common assumption that the process of
recovery of historical memory began after Franco's death in 1975, I will show that this same process had begun almost immediately after the outcome of the Spanish Civil War in April of
1939. Based on a theoretical framework built on the juxtaposition of Lacanian psychoanalysis and recent trauma theory, I argue that the texts object of my study – including some well-known
Francoist canonical works – actually work through the painful and traumatic experiences of the war and the violence imposed by the dictatorship. Because of the unspeakable nature of
psychological trauma and the censorial machinery set in place by the repressive instruments of the Francoist regime, the traumatic experience is never explicitly recounted in these
narratives. However, I will demonstrate how these experiences are expressed in the body of the text in unconventional and unexpected ways such as the tension between chaos and silence, the
representation of hyperbolic violence, speech acts, the representation of space, inter-textual empathy, as well as gaps and disruptions of the narratives. In my dissertation, I will
describe a double-process of reinscription and return of the traumatic event whereby these texts are able to begin a process of working through, becoming, in Dominick LaCapra´s famous
theorization of the concept, an "ethical agent" of history that create a counter-narrative to the Francoist silence surrounding many traumas of the war and resulting
dictatorship. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics in partial fulfillment of the Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester 2015. / October 2, 2015. / Civil, Film, Literature, Spanish, Trauma, War / Includes bibliographical references. / Enrique Álvarez, Professor Co-Directing Dissertation; Robert Romanchuk, Professor Co-Directing Dissertation; Andrew Epstein, University Representative;
Keith Howard, Committee Member; Reineir Leushuis, Committee Member.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_291306 |
| Contributors | Kasten, Jeremy J. (Jeremy James) (authoraut), Álvarez, Enrique (professor co-directing dissertation), Romanchuk, Robert (professor co-directing dissertation), Epstein, Andrew, 1969- (university representative), Howard, Keith David (committee member), Leushuis, Reinier, 1969- (committee member), Florida State University (degree granting institution), College of Arts and Sciences (degree granting college), Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics (degree granting department) |
| Publisher | Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, text |
| Format | 1 online resource (193 pages), computer, application/pdf |
| Coverage | Europe |
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