Waltzing with Bashir: Perpetrator Trauma and Cinema

Description

Waltzing with Bashir proposes a new paradigm for cinema trauma studies – the trauma of the perpetrator. Recognizing a current shift in interest from the trauma suffered by victims to that suffered by perpetrators, the book seeks to theorize this yet under-theorized field. Taking as a point of departure the distinction between testimony given by the victim and confession made by the perpetrator, this pioneering work ventures to define and analyze perpetrator trauma in scholarly, representational, literary, and societal contexts. Driven by the emergence of a new wave of Israeli documentary cinema, the book analyzes Israeli post- second-Intifada films and literature. As Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir and other new wave films demonstrate, Israeli cinema, attached on one side to the legacy of the Holocaust and on the other to the Israeli Occupation, is a highly relevant case for probing the limits of both victim and perpetrator traumas. CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PREFACE INTRODUCTION: FROM VICTIM TO PERPETRATOR TRAUMA PART I. VICTIM TRAUMA 1. THE BODY AS THE BATTLEFIELD 2. CHRONIC VICTIM TRAUMA AND TERROR 3. QUEERNESS, ETHNICITY, AND TERROR PART II. PERPETRATOR TRAUMA 4. THE NEW WAVE OF DOCUMENTARY CINEMA: THE MALE PERPETRATOR 5. THE NEW WAVE OF DOCUMENTARY CINEMA: THE FEMALE PERPETRATOR 6. THE NEW WAVE OF DOCUMENTARY LITERATURE CONCLUSION: THE PERPETRATOR COMPLEX NOTES WORKS CITED FURTHER READING FILMOGRAPHY INDEX