Violence, Trauma and Reconciliation

Mass violence inflicted by states and groups have a prolonged effect on communities and nations. This subject considers the forms of trauma people experience as a response to these forms of violence and explores how this trauma propels calls for apologies, truth commissions, retribution and torture. The subject employs psychoanalytic theory and practice to consider what it means to be traumatised and what it means to seek remedies from law, and uses examples of cross-cultural lawful practice to interrogate ideas of violence and trauma. Legal practices, apologies and demands for reconciliation will be discussed as methods of responding to the rage, pain and mourning that trauma demands. The course will be divided into 4 sections dealing with – trauma and violence, torture, testimony and reconciliation. In these sections we will look at events in South Africa, Northern Ireland, Australia and Nazi Germany, where legal mechanisms, apologies and vengeance have been utilised as responses to events such as genocide, terrorist acts, hostile occupation, and war. Note – some of the content of this course may be distressing.

• 1Employ understandings of psychoanalytic theories of trauma and know how to apply some of these theories to their practice in the field
• 2Understand the effects of torture on a body and on a society
• 3Consider the application of law, torture and ideas of reconciliation in relation to theories of justice
• 4Understand the role of legal rhetoric and policy in its relation to some practices of punishment, prohibition and incarceration
• 5Understand different ideas of reconciliation and the implications of their application in differing contexts.