Da Silva (2019) Narratives of Political Violence.
Citation: Da Silva, Raquel (2019) Narratives of Political Violence: Life Stories of Former Militants, London: Routledge.
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Theory, Research Question, Hypothesis:
Da Silva (2019): Focuses on the life stories of 28 people involved in four left-wing and two right-wing armed movements in Portugal. Seeks to situate these life stories within their cultural, political, and historical context in order to understand their motivations for commencing and disengaging from political violence.
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Method:
Da Silva (2019): Utilises Dialogical Self Theory.
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Notes:
Da Silva (2019): “These individuals were convinced that they could not be mere spectators of the political circumstances of their times. For them, the only viable way to make a difference was through violent acts.”
Da Silva (2019): Does not claim to give voice to individuals, but to be interpreting the words they have articulated. Her own self is central to the interpretive process.
Da Silva (2019:7): “the life stories of former militants seem to be strongly connected to the political narratives that inhabit their spatial and temporal coordinates.” [This being the case, we need to understand what those political narratives are, not so that we can attribute a simple causal power to them, but so that we can understand some of the forces that are shaping — and consciously trying to do so — the circumstances in which people engage in violent mobilisation.]
Da Silva (2019:44): DST views identities as plural and dynamic, in which each person has multiple “Is” that may be in harmony or conflict (e.g. “I as militant,” “I as mother”). “DST proposes that our phenomenological sense of unity is the result of dialogue between different I-positions, as well as their dynamic movements in the dialogical space.”
Da Silva (2019:45): Dialogue occurs in a social, historical, and cultural context. “Each narrative of the self, each perspective of others, each view of reality is the result of the temporary dominance of a set of I-positions that is not predefined but constantly recreated.”
Da Silva (2019:47): “personal stories are socially constructed and cannot be taken as representative of the reality; rather, they are representations of a reality.”
Da Silva (2019:141): Sees disengagement happening under three circumstances: achieving collective goals, personal or organisational issues, or arrest.
Da Silva (2019:143): Sees book as focused mainly on political violence in Portugal, rather than political violence in general, but, drawing on Geertz, sees such thick description as having potential broader implications.
Da Silva (2019:144): “personal identity positions develop in interaction with the political narratives that inhabit individuals’ spatial and temporal coordinates.”
Da Silva (2019:145): “how former militants tell their stories is important. How they choose to represent themselves is just as relevant — if not more so — than any (intangible) assumptions of truth or reality.”