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Specters and Images: When the Levees Broke – A Requiem in Four Acts
Author(s) -
Parasher Prajna
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
international journal of applied psychoanalytic studies
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.314
H-Index - 15
eISSN - 1556-9187
pISSN - 1742-3341
DOI - 10.1002/aps.289
Subject(s) - silence , premise , art , psychology , history , psychoanalysis , aesthetics , philosophy , linguistics
Spike Lee's When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (2006) is examined as a witnessing on the national scale of the trauma felt by those who experienced flooding in the aftermath of Katrina. The premise is that national acknowledgment of the wound, and this mourning, can only happen as the silence following trauma is drawn into public discourse. Spike Lee does this with a variety of interlocking filmic techniques including archival footage, interviews, vistas of devastation and commentary through music. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.