Title: World War II as Trauma, Memory and Fantasy in Japanese Animation
Abstract: In her book Hiroshima Traces Lisa Yoneyama discusses how recent scholarship has tended to define memory in opposition to history, suggesting that “Memory has often been associated with myth or fiction and contrasted with History as written by professionals. [1] Yoneyama herself problematizes this opposition as a “false dichotomy,” stating that “the production of knowledge about the past ... is always enmeshed in the exercise of power and is always accompanied by elements of repression.” [2] She exhorts her readers to remember that, “we begin our investigations into the past with an awareness that historical ‘reality’ can only be made available to us through the mediation of given categories of representation and processes of signification.” [3] This article examines how one of the most significant events in modern Japanese history, defeat in the Second World War, is represented through the medium of animation, a medium which allows history and memory to transform into myth and even into fantasy, ultimately creating for the viewer an experience which allows for a working through of what might be called historical trauma.
Publication Year: 2006
Publication Date: 2006-01-01
Language: en
Type: article
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Cited By Count: 7
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