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Palgrave Macmillan

The Power of Memory and Violence in Central America

  • Book
  • © 2018

Overview

Authors:
  1. Rachel Hatcher

    1. Montreal, Canada

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  • Offers a comparative perspective on memory and discourse in Guatemala and El Salvador

  • Explores the entire post-Peace Accords era in both El Salvador and Guatemala

  • Illustrates how transitions from periods of violent repression to “peace” are decades-long projects

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Table of contents (8 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xvii
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  2. Introduction: On the Calle del Olvido

    • Rachel Hatcher
    Pages 1-26

  3. The Speakers, Writers, Painters, and Plasterers

    • Rachel Hatcher
    Pages 27-60

  4. Schizophrenic Memory in the Land of La Eterna Primavera

    • Rachel Hatcher
    Pages 61-90

  5. Nunca Más in Guatemala

    • Rachel Hatcher
    Pages 91-120

  6. Verdad or Olvido in El Pulgarcito de América

    • Rachel Hatcher
    Pages 121-154

  7. The Past as Monument in El Salvador

    • Rachel Hatcher
    Pages 155-188

  8. Contested Discourse in El Salvador and Guatemala

    • Rachel Hatcher
    Pages 189-222

  9. Conclusion: The Power of Words, and of Remembering

    • Rachel Hatcher
    Pages 223-231

  10. Back Matter

    Pages 233-238
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Keywords

About this book

This book explores the power of words in post-Peace El Salvador and Guatemala—their violent and equally liberating power. The volume explores the entire post-Peace Accords era in both Central American countries. In “post-conflict” settings, denying or forgetting the repressive past and its many victims does violence to those victims, while remembering and giving testimony about the past can be cathartic for survivors, relatives, and even for perpetrators. This project will appeal to readers interested in development, societies in transition, global peace studies, and Central American studies.

Reviews

“An original contribution to scholarship on political contests over memory and forgetting in post-conflict sites. Hatcher has written a deeply informed comparison of El Salvador and Guatemala, with their surprisingly different approaches to the recognition and commemoration of human rights violations.” (Ellen Moodie, Associate Professor, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA)

“Hatcher’s thoughtful exegesis of memory politics in Guatemala and El Salvador highlights language’s power to shape how violent pasts are remembered or forgotten. By reconstructing the charged debates over concepts like “truth,” “amnesty," and “reconciliation” in the aftermath of the two countries’ civil wars, her book makes a valuable contribution to the scholarly literature on how societies grapple with the legacies of state violence.” (Kirsten Weld, Associate Professor, Harvard University, USA)

“Rachel Hatcher’s comparative analysis of sites and methods of remembering in Guatemala and El Salvador is both sensitive and engrossing. The richly detailed and aesthetic documentation of popular memory, palabras, and the people who wield them makes this volume an invaluable contribution to post-war memory studies.” (Mneesha Gellman, Assistant Professor, Emerson College, USA)

“This book...shows the complicity or the deep silences of sectors that seek with multiple strategies to undermine the memory of those who faced genocide, massacres, sexual violence, forced disappearances or torture.” (Irma A. Velásquez Nimatuj, Maya K'ichee' Anthropologist, Guatemala)

Authors and Affiliations

  • Montreal, Canada

    Rachel Hatcher

About the author

Rachel Hatcher is an independent researcher. She held fellowships at the Institute for Reconciliation and Social Justice at the University of the Free State, South Africa, and Concordia University, Québec.

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