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Clothing the Body in Otherness
hills east of Mendocino, California. Her daughter, Alyssa, was present.
As she told some of the tales, she said that usually she would not talk
of things of such force before children, but she felt that at some point
it was vital to be sure that stories were passed on. Traveling with her
child, now a highly responsible nine-year-old, created a special bond
and opportunity. Even so, as she began to describe the violence, her
voice dropped. She admitted, “At night you would hear the sound of
pickups along the road. But you did not look out of the house. There
were vehicles moving on the highway. Or if it was a group of men,
who knows? It was too dangerous. Once when my brother was trav-
eling between towns he came upon bodies. He could see where they
had been mutilated.” Her hands brushed the spots on her body as she
named the wounds, seen through slashed and bloodstained clothes.
The people spoke in hushed tones within the walls of the family com-
pounds of mutilations to the breasts and sexual organs.
The peace process that has been ongoing since the 1990 s raises
questions about what the individual, the community, and ultimately
the state can or will acknowledge and then what narrative forms they
may use to do so. While folklore is often dismissed as trivial, Henry
Glassie, working in Ireland in the midst of the troubles, framed the
act of telling oral history by saying, “When the neighbors gather to-
night, they will speak of the past to discuss a present too horrifying
to face directly. They will tell themselves the story of their place, say-
ing what they know to discover what they think” (Glassie 1982 , 5 ).
One approach to the question of truth in speaking about violence is
to explore the capacity of narratives about transformations to open a
space for both listeners and tellers to review the conduct of individuals
and groups in such times of crisis. Within the circle, all could adopt a
posture of unknowing that simultaneously acknowledged individual
consciousness and social contracts. In a time when it was dangerous
to do so, the names of those suspected of betraying others could be
obliquely referred to as husband or wife, allowing the community to
address and to some extent redress malicious actions.
According to narratives collected in the nineties, the people of Santa
Catarina say that it was the protection of their Lady, Santa Catalina,
that kept the violence away from the center of their town. The town
