US Occupation and Frankétienne's Schizophrenic Writing
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3954367 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Alex Lenoble (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2016 |
| Volume | 21 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 322-349 |
| Publication date | 2016-09-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Haitian studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1090-3488 • E-ISSN: 2333-7311 |
| Publisher | Project MUSE (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1353/jhs.2016.0018 |
| OpenAlex | W2285686637 |
| Language | DE |
| References cited | 10 |
This article explores the ways in which what I am calling the "schizophrenic writing" of Haitian author Frankétienne constitutes an aesthetic response to the US occupation of Haiti (1915-1934). I argue that the US occupation of Haiti is symptomatic of a shift in the symbolic order from which the Haitian subject is once again excluded as "other." In H'éros-chimères , Franketienne's personal trauma-his conception during the rape of his mother-merges with the traumatic structure of Haitian history-from slavery to dictatorships and natural catastrophes. Readable as a bodily inscription and as a textual repetition, the "original" wound(s) initiate(s) Frankétienne's nonrepresentational writing, which questions Western ideologies by occupying the uninhabitable site of the real. The argument is twofold: first, I address some general questions about the specificity of the US occupation compared to other phenomena such as colonization, military deployment, economic exploitation, and even humanitarian intervention. Second, I investigate the notion of Frankétienne's schizophrenic writing, which I posit as an attempt to occupy the real . If colonization and subsequent interventions in Haiti confiscated the domain of the symbolic-typically reserved for Western subjects-then occupying the real may become a political gesture of resistance that reveals the unexpected consequences of what was at the time conceived as a "generous intervention
Aesthetics · Argument (complex analysis · Art · Dictatorship · Ideology · Intervention (counseling · Linguistics · Political science · Politics · Psychiatry · Psychoanalysis · Repetition (rhetorical device · Resistance (ecology · Sociology · Subject (documents · African history and culture studies · Caribbean and African Literature and Culture · Colonialism, slavery, and trade · History · Law · Medicine · Philosophy · Psychology
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |