‘I cannot accept what I have not done’: Storytelling, Gender and Transitional Justice, Journal of Human Rights Practice, 4 Nov. 2011

http://jhrp.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2011/11/04/jhuman.hur015.full#xref-ref-30-1

By Erin Baines and Beth Stewart

Note: JRP’s Gender Justice department assisted in this research.

Abstract

Storytelling can be a process of seeking social equilibrium after violence. We examine this proposition through the stories of Ajok, an Acholi woman who was abducted by the rebel group, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in northern Uganda and who was forced into marriage and motherhood. We consider how her stories contest discrimination by her neighbours and family since her return, creatively reinterpreting the past to defend her innocence and moral character

throughout the war and to defend her rightful place in present society as an Acholi woman and mother. The article concludes by reflecting on the value of locally based and culturally relevant storytelling for survivors in the field and practice of transitional justice.

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