Graphic Narratives of Women in War: Identity Construction in the Works of Zeina Abirached, Miriam Katin, and Marjane Satrapi
Abstract
By applying terminology from trauma theory and a methodological
approach from comics scholarship, this essay discusses three graphic
autobiographies of women. These are A Game for Swallows by Zeina Abirached
(trans. Edward Gauvin, 2012), We are on our Own by Miriam Katin (2006), and
Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi (trans. Anjali Singh, 2004). Two issues are at the
centre of the investigation: the strategies by which these works engage in the
much-debated issues of representing gendered violence, and the representation
of the ways traumatized daughters and their mothers deal with the identity
crises caused by war.