Trauma Studies in the Digital Age: The Impact of Social Media on Trauma Processing in Life Narratives and in Trauma Literature: the Case of Hungary

ended

The aim of the TRAPRODIG project is to analyse cultural and literary trauma processing in the framework of digital memory studies, particularly in relation to the similarities and differences of collective trauma processing and trauma literature in modern democracies and dictatorships; with a special trans-cultural focus on the case of Hungary as a post-socialist country with unresolved twentieth century collective traumas and on life narratives of Hungarian migrants in Europe, especially in the United Kingdom. The interdisciplinary scientific goal of the project is to introduce the concept of “digital (cultural and literary) trauma processing” and develop the scientific field of “digital trauma studies” at the intersection of digital memory studies and cultural trauma studies; based on the outcomes of the two way knowledge transfer in the training-through research of the applicant, who is an expert on literary and cultural trauma studies, at the leading research centre of cultural and digital memory studies at the University of Amsterdam. The TRAPRODIG project is of clear relevance to the Marie Sklodowska-Curie actions programme as it will contribute to a better understanding of the link of current cultural developments to the collective traumas of the past in post-socialist countries; it draws attention to the voices of contemporary migrants within the European cultural framework; and it will also add significantly to the mapping of trauma literature and life narratives in Europe by analysing how the 21st century digital environment influences both personal and collective trauma processing in local, national and trans-national communities within Europe.