Trauma, Dispossession and Narrative Truth: ‘Seeds of the Nation’ of South Sudan

Abstract

Below us, the River Nile snakes in glittering, swamp-lined curves across the endless savannah of central South Sudan. I am on a small internal flight from Juba, the new nation’s capital, heading north to Bor, the old garrison town and capital of Jonglei State, as part of fieldwork in refugee settlement. On the flight are members of Dinka Bor clans returning home for the first time since resettling as refugees in host countries of the Global North. Some, like my two companions and I, are travelling from as far afield as the eastern states of Australia.