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2. Remembering Genocide: Lived Memory and National Mourning
- University of Wisconsin Press
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74 It is diffi cult to over es ti mate the phys i cal, so cial, emo tional, and psycho log i cal dev as ta tion of the 1994 gen o cide in Rwanda. Rwan dan women found them selves in a hor rify ing sit u a tion: the hills, fields, and churches were full of corpses; hus bands, chil dren, broth ers, sis ters, par ents, cou sins, and neigh bors had been hunted like quarry and slaugh tered; women had lost all their ma te rial pos ses sions—their homes, cloth ing, farm ing im ple ments, and cook ing pots; govern ment build ings had been looted and de stroyed. The harsh ma te rial re al ities of post gen o cide Rwanda created an en tirely new con text for kin and so cial re la tions. The ap prox i mately six mil lion ci vil ians who re mained in Rwanda, in clud ing sev eral thou sand gen o cide sur vi vors who were phys i cally and psycho log i cally trau ma tized, had to pick up the pieces of their lives with lit tle as sis tance from inter na tional aid agen cies. In itially, the pop u la tion was in a state of shock as a re sult of the dev as ta tion. Many sur vi vors were ut terly in ca pac i tated by their men tal and emo tional states. A Cath o lic priest, him self a gen o cide sur vi vor, de scribed his ar ri val 2 Re mem ber ing Gen o cide Lived Mem ory and Na tional Mourn ing Remembering Genocide 75 at a rural par ish in south ern Rwanda: “The bishop sent me here in No vem ber 1994 to give Mass. When I ar rived the church was full of sur vi vors— women and chil dren. They were stay ing here. When I spoke to them, they didn’t even look up. They were empty—phys i cally and spir i tu ally. They had noth ing to eat, no soap to wash with, no where to live. I re al ized they could not re ceive Mass, not in the state they were in. They weren’t even human any more.” While cul tural tra di tions of mourn ing may be im pos sible to prac tice in the wake of gen o cide, Rwan dans have im pro vised their own means to put aside their grief and go on liv ing. Some have moved to live in a new place to avoid re mem ber ing. Oth ers re mar ried or gave birth to new chil dren. By bur y ing them selves in the mi nu tiae of every day life, a life that slowly re gained nor malcy with the pas sage of time, they suc ceeded at least par tially in keep ing their mem o ries and the neg a tive emo tions at tached to them— sad ness, anger, guilt, and ha tred—at bay. In a sense, Rwan dan women have crafted a form of col lec tive am ne sia vis-à-vis the “events of 1994,” as many Rwan dans refer to them.1 Yet some times the un ex pect ed ness of every day life (the rec og ni tion of a mo ment in time, a place, a sound, an ob ject, an ac tion, or a con flu ence of these and other fac tors) breaks through this am ne sia and trans ports some one back to the gen o cide, to a place of vi o lence, fear, and ter ror. These re mem brances are em bed ded in every day life and thus im pos sible to con trol com pletely.2 One eth no graphic ex am ple il lus trates the in tru sion of lived mem o ries into every day life and how in di vid ual mourn ing be comes po lit i cal. Im mac u lée lost her hus band the same day the gen o cide started in their com mu nity in south ern Rwanda on April 21, 1994. Im mac u lée hid with her chil dren for sev eral weeks at a neighbor’s house until she de cided to try to es...