[Commlist] CfP: Roundtable on Witnessing -- Memory Studies Association conference

*The (Im)Possibilities of Bearing Witness:*

*The Intrinsic Value and Healing Power of Autobiographic Narratives*

The Witnessing Working Group of the Memory Studies Association (MSA) is 
organizing a roundtable during the forthcoming MSA annual conference in 
Warsaw, Poland, July 5-9, 2021. Due to Covid-19, virtual participation 
will be possible. This roundtable will discuss the role of the 
researcher and the ways in which his/her testimony with traumatic 
experiences influences the course of research, but also the way in which 
the individual traumatic experiences of the researcher affect his/her 
trauma research methodology and narratives produced. Besides that, we 
would like to explore ways through which witness testimonies can 
influence researchers and ordinary readers and if (and to what extent) 
such testimonies may help post-trauma healing and recovery.

According to the psychiatrist Dori Laub, a victim needs the presence of  
a witness (an empathetic listener or reader), to confront the darkness 
of painful memories and to organize and process traumatic experiences. 
“‘Arousers’ of memories” helpedHolocaust survivor Primo Levi (1990) 
describe the horrors of Auschwitz and discover meaning in writing and 
literature. For him, the true witness is the one who does not survive. 
Hence the survivor bears the responsibility to speak for those who 
cannot speak, or to serve as a “moral witness,” to testify with a “moral 
purpose” (Margalit, 2002, 149). Often researchers are put in the 
position of the (moral) witness while investigating the impact of 
traumatic events. How does such implied moral purpose influence the 
scholarly endeavors? And how does the arousal of the scholar's own 
memories in the process of witnessing shape the course of the research 
conducted? Can a researcher turn into “a witness to himself”/herself 
(Laub, 1991, 58), potentially working through his/her own traumatic past 
while witnessing the trauma of others? And how can such self-reflections 
and self-explorations—of the survivor and/or researcher—be productively 
integrated into scholarly writings, possibly exploring paths of healing, 
which reach a wider audience than the ivory tower of academia?

This roundtable is meant as a forum for researchers from various 
academic fields (including but not limited to anthropology, history, 
psychology as well as literary, film and media studies). We seek papers 
of 10 minutes length allowing for an extended discussion.Please submit a 
paper proposal (not exceeding 250 words) in addition to a short bio (no 
longer than 200 words including pertinent publications) via e-mail to 
Alma Jeftic ((alma.jeftic /at/ gmail.com) <mailto:(alma.jeftic /at/ gmail.com)>) and 
Stefanie Hofer ((hofer /at/ vt.edu) <mailto:(hofer /at/ vt.edu)>) *by October 2, 
2020*. Please note that we aim to submit panels to the organising 
committee of the Memory Studies Association *by 15^th October 2020* and 
the final decision will depend on this committee. As in previous years, 
all presenters have to be members of MSA.

For more information please consult MSA webpage:

https://www.memorystudiesassociation.org/warsaw-conference-2021-cfp/ 
<https://www.memorystudiesassociation.org/warsaw-conference-2021-cfp/>

Proposals not limited to the following topics are invited:

-How can traumatic narratives in scholarship be represented to 
adequately reflect the suffering of the victim?

-(Im)possibilities of bearing witness and how to be addressed in 
qualitative research?

-Witnessing and the dangers of appropriation

-The overwhelming nature of autobiographical narratives

-The healing power of trauma narratives

-Cultural representations of trauma and recovery as catharses

-(Moral) witnessing and activism

-Postcolonial witnessing and non-Western healing paradigms

References:

Laub, D. (1992). Bearing Witness, or the Vicissitudes of Listening. In 
S. Felman and D. Laub, /Testimony: Crises of Witnessing in Literature, 
Psychoanalysis, and History/ (pp. 57-74). New York: Routledge.

Levi, P. (1990). /The Sixth Day and Other Tales/. London: Simon & Schuster.

Margalit, A. (2002). /The Ethics of Memory. /Cambridge, MA: Harvard 
University Press.

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