This research project will interrogate and analyze prevalent thinking about the Colonial Wars taking as its starting point testimony from the children of war veterans. In other words, it will draw on the postmemory of the Colonial Wars—a memory carried by the offspring of war veterans, who grew up submerged in war narratives experienced by their parents’ generation.
We will investigate how post-Colonial Wars generations reconstruct this past, using three main sources: family narratives; inter and intra-generational dialogues; and public discourse, particularly literature. Starting with the perspective of these subsequent generations, we will explore the cultural and social impact of the Colonial Wars on this group and its repercussions in the Portuguese collective memory, as well as on the debate about Portuguese identity.
This project is interdisciplinary, drawing on and adding to literary criticism, cultural studies, psychiatry, sociology, history and political science.