Description
This essay analyzes a display of Wenonah and the “Lover’s Leap” in Winona, Minnesota, as an example of dissociative memory(-)work. Applying dissociation to the organization of commemorative space, I attend to how the display uses markers of commemorative labor as modifying terms that invite audiences to dissociate investiture from the figure represented in order to privilege the people, actions, and temporal frameworks of those who made and maintained the memorial. This analysis proposes different dissociative units relevant to memory(-)work, including persona memorialized/persona memorializing, act memorialized/act of memorializing, and time memorialized/time of memorializing. Attention to this example of memory(-)work helps critics account for a unique and resilient form of rhetorical colonialism.
Publication Date
1-1-2023
Keywords
Communication Studies, Faculty Works, Scholarship, Colonialism, Wenonah
Department
Communication Studies
Recommended Citation
Gaffey, Adam J., "Making the Lover’s Leap: Wenonah, Rhetorical Colonialism, and Dissociative Memory(-)Work" (2023). Communication Studies Faculty Works. 45.
https://openriver.winona.edu/communicationstudiesfacultyworks/45
Unique Identifier
WSUCMSTFACWORKS-2023-Gaffey-Making the Lover s Leap Wenonah Rhetorical Colonialism and Dissociative Memory - Work.pdf
