The Voices of Memory: Silence as a Strategy in Edwidge Danticat's The Dew Breaker

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.35588/gf01ym23

Keywords:

Danticat, memory, silence

Abstract

This research proposes to analyze the relationship between silence and the types of narrators. It examines the concept of silence in the stories "The Book of the Dead" and "The Dew Breaker" by Edwidge Danticat. Throughout this article, the concepts of memory and postmemory will be studied, along with their roles within the two groups of characters. This article explores how each operates depending on the content of the story and how it influences its structure. It will also examine the level of violence to which the protagonists were exposed and their role as victims and/or perpetrators in the context of Jean-Claude Duvalier's dictatorship and forced migration.

Author Biography

  • Pamela Varas Zúñiga, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso

    Bachelor of Arts. Universidad Diego Portales. Santiago de Chile.

    Master's Degree in Latin American Literature. Universidad de Santiago de Chile.

    PhD student in Latin American Literature. Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso.

References

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Bellamy, M. R. (2012). More than Hunter or Prey: Duality and Traumatic Memory in Edwidge Danticat’s The Dew Breaker. MELUS, 37(1), 177-197. https://doi.org/10.1353/mel.2012.0005

Clitandre, N. (2009). Dissertation: Haiti re-membered: Exile, diaspora, and transnational imaginings in the writings of Edwidge Danticat and Myriam Chancy. Proquest Dissertations [Tesis de doctorado]. California: University of California, Berkeley.

Danticat, E. (2005). El quebrantador. Norma.

Danticat, E. (2010). Crear en peligro: el trabajo del artista migrante. Banda Propia.

Eder, R. (2004). Off the island (The Dew Breaker, by Edwidge Danticat). The New York Times, 21, 1–2. https://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/21/books/off-the-island.html

Falquina, S. M. (2014). Postcolonial trauma theory and the short story cycle: Edwidge Danticat’s The Dew Breaker. ES Review Spanish Journal of English Studies, 35, 171–192. https://revistas.uva.es/index.php/esreview/article/view/731

Fuchs, R. (2015). Hiding and Exposing Violence: Euphemisms in Edwidge Danticat’s The Dew Breaker. L’Érudit Franco-Español, 7, 51-54.

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Ibarrola, A. (2010). The language of wounds and scars in Edwidge Danticat's The Dew Breaker, a case study in trauma symptoms and the recovery process. Journal of English Studies, 8, 23-56.

Kakutani, M. (2004). Hiding from a brutal past spent shattering lives in Haiti. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/10/books/books-of-the-times-hiding-from-a-brutal-past-spent-shattering-lives-in-haiti.html

Le Bretón, D. (2009). El silencio: aproximaciones. Sequitur.

Mehta, B. (2009). Dyasporic trauma, memory, and migration in Edwidge danticat’s the dew breaker. En Notions of Identity, Diaspora, and Gender in Caribbean Women’s Writing (pp. 63–88). Palgrave Macmillan US.

Najmanovich, D. (2000). Silencios Activos, Silencios Pasivos. Scribd. https://es.scribd.com/doc/269073798/Silencios-Activos-Silencios-Pasivos

Spengler, B. (2015). Art as Engagement: Violence, Trauma, and the Role of the Reader. En Danticat’s E. The Dew Breaker, Contemporary Women's Writing, 8. 189–205. https://doi.org/10.1093/cww/vpt020

Trouillot, R. (1995). Silenciando el pasado. El poder y la producción de la historia. Comares.

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Published

2025-06-30

How to Cite

The Voices of Memory: Silence as a Strategy in Edwidge Danticat’s The Dew Breaker. (2025). Palimpsesto, 15(26), 57-74. https://doi.org/10.35588/gf01ym23