ABSTRACT

This year marks the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Rwanda genocide. This volume, the product of over 20years of engagement with Rwanda and its diaspora, offers a timely reminder of the necessity of rethinking the genocide’s social history.

Examining a range of marginal stories and using Rwanda as a case study, The Marginalised in Genocide Narratives’ analysis of the transformation of genocide into a powerful narrative of a nation establishes an innovative means of understanding the lived spaces of violence and its enduring legacy. In a distinctive approach to the social history of genocide, this book engages with the marginalised; foregrounds genocide’s untold stories; and uses the conceptual framework of the constellation of genocide narratives to create connections among multiple social actors and identify narrative themes that address the unequal power and interdependence of narratives.

Adopting a multi-level narrative methodology that addresses the value of multiple narrative framings for understanding genocides, The Marginalised in Genocide Narratives will appeal to students and researchers interested in sociology, conflict and peace studies, history, African studies and narrative research. It may also appeal to policy-makers interested in genocide studies and contemporary social history.

chapter 1|22 pages

Introduction

Narrating genocide and the genocide narrative

chapter 3|21 pages

Reframing culpability, shame and guilt

Non-perpetrator members of the perpetrator group

chapter 4|18 pages

Revisiting the figure of the heroic rescuer

Communal rescue, care and resistance

chapter 5|18 pages

Families of mixed ethnic backgrounds

The intimate burden of those caught in-between the politics of ethnic identity

chapter 7|20 pages

Civilian returnees

Intra-ethnic differences and continuities with the past and exile