DELC Research Seminar Series: Max Silverman In brief Speaker - Professor Max Silverman (University of Leeds) Title - Trauma, memory and disruptive genealogy Discussant - Professor Nacim Pak-Shiraz (Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Edinburgh) Venue - 50 George Square Abstract by Max Silverman In recent years, transnational and transcultural approaches to memory have expanded the scope of memory studies beyond the framework of nation and community. But to what extent is this new phase of ‘interconnected’ memory studies still premised on trauma theory and its accompanying vocabulary of violence, the wound, transmission, belatedness, haunting, victimhood and melancholia? In this talk, I will argue that although this approach has provided a much-needed focus on the ways past violence continues to affect the present in invisible ways, it tends to foreclose a broader intersectional analysis of cultural works in which traumatic memory, loss and mourning are always articulated with other, often contradictory and paradoxical, processes. I will apply this approach to the film Memory Box (2021) by the Lebanese filmmakers Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige, in which multiple intersections can be read not only in terms of a genealogical transmission of the trauma of the Lebanese civil war (1975-1990) but also tell a knotted story about time, culture and media. Can theory open up cultural works to ambivalent encounters in a way that readings through the lens of traumatic memory rarely allow? About the speakers Max Silverman is Professor of Modern French Studies at the University of Leeds. He works on post-Holocaust culture, postcolonial theory and cultures, and questions of memory, trauma, race and violence. His monograph Palimpsestic Memory: the Holocaust and Colonialism in French and Francophone Fiction and Film (Berghahn, 2013) considers the connections between the Holocaust and colonialism in the French and Francophone cultural imaginary. He has published four co-edited books with Griselda Pollock on the theme of the ‘concentrationary’: Concentrationary Cinema (Berghahn, 2011), Concentrationary Memories (I. B. Tauris, 2014), Concentrationary Imaginaries (I. B. Tauris, 2015), and Concentrationary Art (Berghahn, 2019). His recent work questions traumatic memory studies in relation to contemporary Lebanese film. Professor Nacim Pak-Shiraz is Personal Chair of Cinema and Iran at the University of Edinburgh. Her research focuses on cinema and visual culture in the Middle East, particularly Iran. She has published in the fields of visual cultures, constructions of masculinity, and the engagement of religion and film, including Shi‘i Islam in Iranian Cinema: Religion and Spirituality in Film (2011 & 2018), and Visualizing Iran: From Antiquity to Present (ed. 2017). Professor Pak-Shiraz is also curator of several film festivals in Edinburgh, and has been as a jury member and speaker at several international film festivals in the Czech Republic, Turkey and Iran. Browse Nacim Pak-Shiraz's staff profile About the seminar series The DELC Research Seminar Series (DRSS) encourages collaboration and coproduction between staff and students across European Languages and Cultures and beyond. Entry is free and everyone is welcome. No registration is necessary. Are you interested in studying European Languages and Cultures? Our interdisciplinary environment brings together specialists in nine European languages, and the many cultures worldwide in which they're spoken, with experts in film, literature, theatre, translation and intermediality. Working with colleagues elsewhere in LLC, and across the wider University, we are able to support research which crosses boundaries between disciplines and/or languages. Find out more about studying with us Mar 09 2023 17.30 - 18.30 DELC Research Seminar Series: Max Silverman Join us in person for a seminar by Professor Max Silverman (University of Leeds) on traumatic memory studies in relation to contemporary Lebanese film, including an intersectional analysis of the 2021 film Memory Box by filmmakers Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige. Project Room 1.06 50 George Square University of Edinburgh EH8 9LH Edinburgh Find the venue: 50 George Square
DELC Research Seminar Series: Max Silverman In brief Speaker - Professor Max Silverman (University of Leeds) Title - Trauma, memory and disruptive genealogy Discussant - Professor Nacim Pak-Shiraz (Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Edinburgh) Venue - 50 George Square Abstract by Max Silverman In recent years, transnational and transcultural approaches to memory have expanded the scope of memory studies beyond the framework of nation and community. But to what extent is this new phase of ‘interconnected’ memory studies still premised on trauma theory and its accompanying vocabulary of violence, the wound, transmission, belatedness, haunting, victimhood and melancholia? In this talk, I will argue that although this approach has provided a much-needed focus on the ways past violence continues to affect the present in invisible ways, it tends to foreclose a broader intersectional analysis of cultural works in which traumatic memory, loss and mourning are always articulated with other, often contradictory and paradoxical, processes. I will apply this approach to the film Memory Box (2021) by the Lebanese filmmakers Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige, in which multiple intersections can be read not only in terms of a genealogical transmission of the trauma of the Lebanese civil war (1975-1990) but also tell a knotted story about time, culture and media. Can theory open up cultural works to ambivalent encounters in a way that readings through the lens of traumatic memory rarely allow? About the speakers Max Silverman is Professor of Modern French Studies at the University of Leeds. He works on post-Holocaust culture, postcolonial theory and cultures, and questions of memory, trauma, race and violence. His monograph Palimpsestic Memory: the Holocaust and Colonialism in French and Francophone Fiction and Film (Berghahn, 2013) considers the connections between the Holocaust and colonialism in the French and Francophone cultural imaginary. He has published four co-edited books with Griselda Pollock on the theme of the ‘concentrationary’: Concentrationary Cinema (Berghahn, 2011), Concentrationary Memories (I. B. Tauris, 2014), Concentrationary Imaginaries (I. B. Tauris, 2015), and Concentrationary Art (Berghahn, 2019). His recent work questions traumatic memory studies in relation to contemporary Lebanese film. Professor Nacim Pak-Shiraz is Personal Chair of Cinema and Iran at the University of Edinburgh. Her research focuses on cinema and visual culture in the Middle East, particularly Iran. She has published in the fields of visual cultures, constructions of masculinity, and the engagement of religion and film, including Shi‘i Islam in Iranian Cinema: Religion and Spirituality in Film (2011 & 2018), and Visualizing Iran: From Antiquity to Present (ed. 2017). Professor Pak-Shiraz is also curator of several film festivals in Edinburgh, and has been as a jury member and speaker at several international film festivals in the Czech Republic, Turkey and Iran. Browse Nacim Pak-Shiraz's staff profile About the seminar series The DELC Research Seminar Series (DRSS) encourages collaboration and coproduction between staff and students across European Languages and Cultures and beyond. Entry is free and everyone is welcome. No registration is necessary. Are you interested in studying European Languages and Cultures? Our interdisciplinary environment brings together specialists in nine European languages, and the many cultures worldwide in which they're spoken, with experts in film, literature, theatre, translation and intermediality. Working with colleagues elsewhere in LLC, and across the wider University, we are able to support research which crosses boundaries between disciplines and/or languages. Find out more about studying with us Mar 09 2023 17.30 - 18.30 DELC Research Seminar Series: Max Silverman Join us in person for a seminar by Professor Max Silverman (University of Leeds) on traumatic memory studies in relation to contemporary Lebanese film, including an intersectional analysis of the 2021 film Memory Box by filmmakers Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige. Project Room 1.06 50 George Square University of Edinburgh EH8 9LH Edinburgh Find the venue: 50 George Square
Mar 09 2023 17.30 - 18.30 DELC Research Seminar Series: Max Silverman Join us in person for a seminar by Professor Max Silverman (University of Leeds) on traumatic memory studies in relation to contemporary Lebanese film, including an intersectional analysis of the 2021 film Memory Box by filmmakers Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige.
