Item Details

abstract

Despite many clear points of connection, the field of rhetoric has largely remained silent on the notion of trauma, or overwhelming experience. I seek to establish the ways in which trauma simultaneously creates the exigency for rhetoric and complicates its task, using Holocaust survivor Charlotte Delbo's groundbreaking memoir Auschwitz and After as a case study. I argue, drawing upon the work of Susan J. Brison, that the externalization of her memories in narrative form allows Delbo to reclaim the self devastated by trauma; the text, however, shatters conventional expectations of what constitutes a coherent narrative, as set forth by Walter Fisher in his narrative paradigm. I conclude that Auschwitz and After is significant in that it enacts the trauma it seeks to transmit, a necessary approach in the face of the loss of reason and language engendered by the Holocaust.

subject

Charlotte Delbo

Holocaust literature

narrative

rhetoric

trauma

contributor

Malsin, Mikaela Janet (author)

Beasley von Burg, Alessandra (committee chair)

Hyde, Michael J (committee member)

Franco, Dean (committee member)

date

2012-06-12T08:35:48Z (accessioned)

2012-06-12T08:35:48Z (available)

2012 (issued)

degree

Communication (discipline)

identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/10339/37259 (uri)

language

en (iso)

publisher

Wake Forest University

title

READING RHETORIC THROUGH TRAUMA: CHARLOTTE DELBO'S AUSCHWITZ AND AFTER

type

Thesis