We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
A Lacanian Reading of "No-No Boy" and "Obasan": Traumatic Thing and Transformation into Subjects of Jouissance.
- Authors
Chen, Fu-Jen
- Abstract
This essay gives a Lacanian interpretation of the literary works "No-No Boy," by John Okada and "Obasan," by Joy Kogawa. The books discuss the subject of forced internment of ethnic Japanese in America and Canada during World War II, an experience that can be characterized as a traumatic "thing." The traumatic thing, as defined by Lacan, is characterized by the fact that it is impossible to imagine and becomes the cause of the most fundamental human passion. To the author, both novels target the impossible experiences of trauma.
- Subjects
CANADA; UNITED States; NO-No Boy (Book : Okada); OBASAN (Book : Kogawa); COMPARATIVE literature; LITERATURE studies; KOGAWA, Joy, 1935-; LACAN, Jacques, 1901-1981; OKADA, John, 1923-1971; EMOTIONAL trauma; WORLD War II; CONCENTRATION camps; INTERNMENT of Japanese Americans, 1942-1945; JAPANESE Americans
- Publication
Comparatist, 2007, Vol 31, p105
- ISSN
0195-7678
- Publication type
Literary Criticism
- DOI
10.1353/com.2007.0002