Intergenerational Trauma in the Aftermath of Genocide

Abstract

Intergenerational trauma can be understood as the transmission of historical trauma and its adverse effects and impact across generations. This has been witnessed across many nations, populations and marginalized groups, particularly in countries that have experienced long histories of war, systemic violence and/or human rights abuses. The article focuses on Cambodia in the aftermath of the Khmer Rouge and subsequent genocide as the impact of this short but profoundly devastating period in the country’s history continues to permeate many layers of life in Cambodia today. Some examples of trauma-informed research from Rwanda are also presented to highlight cross-cultural understandings of trauma and resilience. Through the research, this article explores the long-standing impacts of intergenerational trauma on the Cambodian population and discusses resilience in the aftermath of human rights violations.

Resilience in torture survivors: reflections, learnings and ways forward

“…Thus, in Cambodia resilience would be associated with a sense of transcendence, of spirituality and acceptance of destiny that goes beyond life, of grounding oneself in the body and consciousness and avoiding negative emotional thinking, in connection with Buddhist moral principles. (Wyatt, 2019(Wyatt, , 2023. One study describes how in pre-Taliban Afghanistan, resilience after the war emerged from a sense of moral and social order embodied in the expression of key cultural values: faith, family unity, service, effort, morality and honour, (Eggerman & Panter-Brick, 2010) In South Africa, by contrast, resilience is associated with the well-known concept of Ubuntu, a term that has been universalised to indicate an essentially relational ethic, which values relationships of interdependence, friendship and trust, reciprocity and reconciliation, harmonious relationships, in which actions are morally right insofar as they honour the capacity to relate communally, reduce discord and restore communal balances (Ewuoso & Hall, 2019).…”