Migrations
Abstract
[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT REQUEST OF AUTHOR.] "If I had to tell the story in one line or two, I would tell it this way: I loved her and she did not choose me, though I believed she would." At 28, the narrator tells her mother she was abused as a young child by her father. The narrator's mother does not believe her, and the two become estranged. Written in lyric form, the personal narrative is set alongside a collage of facts, stories, and photographs from a range of disciplines, including phrenology, medical science, television, zoology, pop culture, and particle physics. One of the essay's strongest through lines is that of embodied memory and the sensory experience of living in a body that has undergone trauma. Unfamiliar juxtapositions and disruptions in the text along with photographs of narrative images attempt to evoke in the reader some of the sensations the narrator herself experiences. This essay is the study of one family within broader contexts of sexual violence, cultural ambivalence, mental illness, memory, the body, and various systems of dysfunction. At its core, though, it is the story of the narrator's love for, and loss of, her mother.
Degree
Ph. D.
Thesis Department
Rights
Access is limited to the campuses of the University of Missouri.