Kali Tal

June 13, 2006

We Didn't Know What Would Happen: Opening the Discourse on Incest and Sexual Abuse

The work of putting Worlds of Hurt online is going well. The seventh chapter, "We Didn't Know What Would Happen: Opening the Discourse on Incest and Sexual Abuse," is now available. I hope it will be helpful to those who are searching for substantive material about the cultural and political history of the feminist struggle to reveal and challenge the institutions that support and conceal violence against women and children. I think this chapter is also particularly important because it directly addresses the racism of mainstream, white feminism and argues that any true progress will need to be based on the recognition that race and gender are inseparable issues for women not just women of color, but for all women.

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June 9, 2006

Trauma, Community and the Revisionary Process

Just a notice to let folks know that the sixth chapter of Worlds of Hurt is now online: "There Was No Plot and I Discovered It By Mistake: Trauma, Community and the Revisionary Process." I think it's particularly timely given the rising U.S.-Iraq veterans antiwar movement. The chapter discusses the ways in which the political protests of antiwar Vietnam veterans were gradually channeled into the medical system, with the institutionalization of the diagnosis of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Angry veterans became "sick" veterans, paid by the VA to take and stay on medications and in therapy that dulled their inclinations to protest and invalidated their critiques of U.S. policy via the process of medicalization of their complaints.

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June 5, 2006

The Farmer of Dreams: The Writing of W.D. Ehrhart

Another chapter of my 1995 book, Worlds of Hurt has made it to the web. Check out "The Farmer of Dreams: The Writing of W.D. Ehrhart." Though my discussion of Ehrhart's work ends ten years ago, the writer has kept on writing. I encourage scholars and writers &emdash; especially those interested in the effects of war on soldiers and veterans — to use my work as a basis for further discussions of Vietnam veteran and later veteran writers. Also check out Ehrhart's web site, which hosts a lot of great recent writing and will bring you up to date on this long-time antiwar activist, novelist, non-fiction writer and poet.

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