Conjunctions: Life Narratives in the Field of Human Rights

Abstract

The last decades of the twentieth century witnessed the unprecedented rise in genres of life writing, narratives published primarily in the West¹ but circulated widely around the globe. This “memoir boom” has certainly occurred in English-speaking countries, from Australia to Jamaica, from England to South Africa, and in European countries, especially France and Germany.² However, there has been a relative boom in personal narratives coming from elsewhere in the world as well. In many global locations, in post-Maoist China and Latin America, in North Africa and the Philippines, in Northern and Eastern Europe, life narratives have been told, transcribed, published, and translated, gaining both local and international audiences.