The Witness in History
The Witness in History
(28) The Witness in History - Greg Shaya, Department of History
Elie Wiesel famously remarked that “If the Greeks invented tragedy ... our generation invented a new literature, that of testimony.” We can debate the novelty of this invention, but there is no doubt that our culture grants an urgent power to eyewitness accounts of traumatic events. Such accounts can uncover hidden miseries and generate humanitarian action. They can illuminate powerful lessons. Yet they can also be unreliable, prone to exaggeration or outright distortion. In this seminar, we will study a series of accounts from the early 17th century to the early 21st, accounts that bear witness to war, atrocity, disease, disaster, and deprivation. Looking to memoirs, humanitarian reports, oral histories, journalism, art, fiction, poetry, and films, we will consider profound questions. What words, what images will do in the face of terrible suffering? How do we—and how should we—respond to these accounts of suffering? When does curiosity and sympathy give way to voyeurism? Can such accounts help to heal the wounds of conflict?
Readings/viewings will include (in part or in whole):
- Bartolomé de las Casas, The Destruction of the Indies
- Goya’s Disasters of War
- Jacob Riis, How the Other Half Lives
- Vera Brittain, Testament of Youth
- George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia
- Michael Herr, Dispatches
- Waltz With Bashir, Dir. Ari Folman
- Romeo Dallaire, Shake Hands With the Devil
- Susan Sontag, Regarding the Pain of Others
- Luc Boltanski, Suffering at Distance
- and more