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Cacophony of Voices: A K’iche’ Mayan Narrative of Remembrance and ForgettingMcGill University This article analyzes the links and cleavages between collective and individual memory processes following a situation of war and terror. Nearly two decades after the most brutal period of Guatemala’s 36-year civil war, the notions of ‘memory’ and ‘truth’ have become critical socio-political issues; institutional memory projects have taken an important place in the peace process and in Mayanist political struggles. For many Mayan Indians, however, experiences of, and explanations for, past violence are not accommodated or represented by a unified narrative of ‘social memory.’ The postwar memory work of many Mayan Indians vacillates between a multitude of discourses and strategies (subjective, local, national and transnational) used to ‘make sense’ out of a chaotic past and unstable present. By examining the story of a single transnational K’iche’ Mayan man and placing it within its particular cultural, historical and communal context, the article problematizes the notion of ‘social memory’ and ‘truth’ as used conventionally in institutional political discourse. It also engages the scientific (psychiatric) literature on trauma and violence, which tends to frame memory within distinctly Western assumptions regarding individualism, morality and narrative coherence. It argues that, for Mayans whose memory work falls outside the boundaries of such authoritative institutions and discourses, the ability to balance a variety of world views and explanations for past brutality becomes a crucial coping mechanism in the fragmented post-war era, as it has historically.
Key Words: Guatemala • Maya • memory • narrative • trauma • war
Transcultural Psychiatry, Vol. 37, No. 3,
355-381 (2000) This article has been cited by other articles:
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