Ethiopia’s history includes too many dead from political violence. There are long histories, but even if we start only from the overthrow of the imperial regime in 1974, the lines are traumatic, winding their way through cities strewn with bodies of children killed at night, famine ravaged villages, battlefields in the north, east and west, […]
Continue Reading →From hospital rooms, mortuaries, and cemeteries come imagery of the immediate period of “post-death”—in those first hours and days—that rarely has been so sharply rendered for public view. This is usually a time passed privately, with the transition from life to death witnessed by those in closest proximity, often accompanied by specific rituals and in-gatherings sought for comfort. But now there is the absence of these familiar, often familial, moments.
Continue Reading →“To keep the narratives and to save our history from being told by only one side, this work is very essential…”– Sana Yazigi. Last week I had the chance to talk with Sana Yazigi about her work as project leader of “Creative Memory of the Syrian Revolution.” You can listen to the entire interview, or read the transcript. In the transcript, you will also find links to some of the music and artwork that Yazigi refers to.
Continue Reading →This is the third of a three part series introducing my new book Memory from the Margins: Ethiopia’s Red Terror Martyrs Memorial Museum (Palgrave 2019). Previously I discussed some of the theoretical framework that informs the study. In this essay, I provide an overview of the how the study of the Red Terror Martyrs […]
Continue Reading →The formulation of ‘memory from the margins’ introduces several key terms. In the first instance, ‘memory’ as a concept is itself composed of multiple elements that arise out of a relationship to the past, and includes ideas of community and ethics. ‘From’ captures the movement that endows memory with disruptive capacity. ‘Margins’ identifies a starting point for narratives that do not fit the dominant story of the present.
Continue Reading →My book Memory from the Margins: Ethiopia’s Red Terror Martyrs Memorial Museum (Palgrave 2019) has just been published and I am launching a three part blog series introducing the main themes of the volume. In this post, I begin with the two questions that prompted the research behind the book.
The first emerged out […]
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