“I Was Rahim”: Postmemory, Gendered Hermaphroditism, and Embodied Precarity in Hashimi’s The Pearl That Broke Its Shell
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17507/tpls.1611.36Keywords:
vulnerability, gender, memory, postmemory, trauma, gendered hermaphroditismAbstract
This paper examines how ideas of vulnerability and post-traumatic memory are fixed within the everyday lives of Afghan women through Nadia Hashmi’s The Pearl That Broke Its Shell (2014). Through the deeply entwined narratives of Shekiba and Rahima, who live parallel lives years apart, the study explores how gendered trauma is not only experienced but also transmitted across generations. Through an analysis of the Afghan custom of bacha posh, the paper suggests that the freedom associated with a male identity is often accompanied by uncertainty and conflict in constructing individual gender identity and selfhood. Rooted in vulnerability theory, gender performativity, and postmemory, the study introduces the concept of gendered hermaphroditism to describe this enforced oscillation between the two gender roles. The novel reveals inherited trauma as both a living condition and a site of narrative resistance.
References
Abu-Lughod, L. (2013). Do Muslim Women Need Saving? Harvard University Press.
Ahmed, L. (1992). Women and Gender in Islam. Yale University Press.
Ahmed, S. (2004). Affective economies. Social Text, 22(2), 117–139.
Bhabha, H. K. (1994). The Location of Culture. Routledge.
Bond, L., Craps, S., & Vermeulen, P. (Eds.). (2017). Memory Unbound: Tracing the Dynamics of Memory Studies. Berghahn Books.
Bremner, J. D. (2016). Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: From Neurobiology to Treatment. John Wiley & Sons.
Brewin, C. R. (2007). Autobiographical Memory for Trauma: Update on Four Controversies. Memory, 15(3), 227–248.
Butler, J. (1990). Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. Routledge.
Cacioppo, J. T., & Hawkley, L. C. (2003). Social Isolation and Health. Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 46(3), S39–S52.
Craps, S. (2013). Postcolonial Witnessing: Trauma Out of Bounds. Palgrave Macmillan.
Crenshaw, K. (1989). Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex. University of Chicago Legal Forum, 139–167.
Crews, R. D. (2015). Afghan Modern: The History of a Global Nation. Harvard University Press.
Crownshaw, R., Kilby, J., & Rowland, A. (Eds.). (2010). The Future of Memory. Berghahn Books.
Enloe, C. (2000). Maneuvers: The International Politics of Militarizing Women's Lives. University of California Press.
Evans, G. W., & Kim, P. (2010). Childhood Poverty and Health. Psychological Science, 21(5), 953–957.
Ewans, M. (2002). Afghanistan: A Short History of Its People and Politics. HarperCollins.
Felitti, V. J., Anda, R. F., Nordenberg, D., Williamson, D. F., Spitz, A. M., Edwards, V., Koss, M. P., & Marks, J. S. (1998). Relationship of Childhood Abuse and Household Dysfunction to Many of the Leading Causes of Death in Adults. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 14(4), 245–258.
Felman, S., & Laub, D. (1992). Testimony: Crises of Witnessing in Literature, Psychoanalysis, and History. Routledge.
Gilson, E. C. (2014). The Ethics of Vulnerability: A Feminist Analysis of Social Life and Practice. Routledge.
Hashimi, N. (2014). The Pearl That Broke Its Shell. William Morrow.
Herman, J. L. (1992). Trauma and Recovery. Basic Books.
Hiro, D. (1985). Iran Under the Ayatollahs. Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Hirsch, M. (2008). The Generation of Postmemory. Poetics Today, 29(1), 103–128.
Lazarus, R. S., & Folkman, S. (1984). Stress, Appraisal, and Coping. Springer.
Mahmood, S. (2005). Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject. Princeton University Press.
Masten, A. S. (2014). Global Perspectives on Resilience. Child Development, 85(1), 6–20.
Nordberg, J. (2014). The Underground Girls of Kabul. Crown Publishers.
Ozer, E. J., Best, S. R., Lipsey, T. L., & Weiss, D. S. (2003). Predictors of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder and Symptoms in Adults: A Meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 129(1), 52–73.
Rasanayagam, A. (2010). Afghanistan: A Modern History. I. B. Tauris.
Rashid, A. (2000). Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia. Yale University Press.
Reading, A. (2022). The Social Inheritance of the Holocaust: Gender, Culture and Memory. Palgrave Macmillan.
Rubin, B. R. (2002). The Fragmentation of Afghanistan: State Formation and Collapse in the International System. Yale University Press.
Simpson, S. J. (2012). Afghanistan: A Cultural History. Interlink Books.
Spivak, G. C. (1988). Can the Subaltern Speak? In C. Nelson & L. Grossberg (Eds.), Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture (pp. 271–313). University of Illinois Press.
UN Women. (2024). Gender Country Profile: Afghanistan. UN Women Afghanistan.
van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Viking.
van der Kolk, B. A., & Fisler, R. (1995). Dissociation and the Fragmentary Nature of Traumatic Memories: Overview and Exploratory Study. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 8(4), 505–525.
Wimpelmann, T. (2017). The Pitfalls of Protection: Gender, Violence, and Power in Afghanistan. University of California Press.
