These stark words were spoken by renowned South African psychologist and researcher, Professor Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, on 31 January 2024 in a lecture at VU Amsterdam. The lecture came at the invitation from Professor Katya Tolstoj on behalf of the Faculty of Religion and Theology (FRT) at VU Amsterdam and focused on transgenerational trauma in post-conflict societies. Drawing on her wealth of experience from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in South Africa and her continued work in the field of transgenerational trauma in post-Apartheid South Africa, Gobodo-Madikizela’s lecture centred around unprocessed trauma in the aftermath of Apartheid.
In the minds of many South Africans, the time of the TRC represented an opportunity for consolation and a moment of hope for a new dawn. It was seen as a time which would break years of political silence and “shatter the apartheid state’s wall of denial of the events that shook the country to its core.” Instead, as the quote in the beginning suggests, the vision which the TRC promised has not been realised. What remains now is a deep disappointment and little hope as a traumatic past keeps replaying in the lives of post-apartheid generations. In her lecture, Gobodo-Madikizela reflected on the South African situation and proposed a new way of theorising and conceptualising transgenerational trauma by looking at it from a “tri-directional perspective”.
Tri-Directional Perspective
According to Gobodo-Madikizela, her tri-directional perspective proposes that remembering crosses and re-crosses past, present, and future temporalities, conceptualising a “triadic” view of memory. The first temporality points back historically several generations from the present and unfolds the transgenerational transmission of the past to the present. Gobodo-Madikizela explains that this occurs in specific cases where suffering occurred, but justice was not met. In the case of post-Apartheid South Africa, descendants of victims are burdened by memories which are not their own, but an obligation rests with them, ensuing in an insatiable quest for reparative justice.
The second temporality is triggered by an entanglement of present experience and memories of past experiences. Here a manifestation of the past is felt and brought to awareness by triggers in the present. As a poignant example of this temporality, Gobodo-Madikizela described the plight of many black university students in South Africa. In their proximity to the privilege of their white peers, they experience a heightened awareness of the deep inequality. For them, even the physical environment recalls the cruelty of apartheid’s deep inequality and resulting emotions permeate traumatic meaning.
The third temporality was described as covering all three dimensions of time. From present experience, it stretches deep into the apartheid (even colonial) past, and it anticipates a grim future, “as if in a prophetic foretelling of traumatic violence where the past is reconstituted and re-lived in subsequent generations.” Gobodo-Madikizela again referred to an example of horrific injustice occurring during the post-Apartheid regime: the massacre of striking miners in 2012 by police. The miners in the Marikana area had gone on strike, demanding better wages when police opened fire and killed 34 men. This instance was reminiscent of the police brutality of the apartheid years. As Gobodo-Madikizela pointed out, “[the story] illustrates that, while the colour of those in power has changed, little has changed in the way that the power is exercised.” When left unaccounted for, an oppressive past becomes a ruthless present, and foreshadows a violent future.
Gobodo-Madikizela’s tri-directional perspective for understanding transgenerational trauma moves beyond the transmission of an atrocious past as merely phantomatic manifestations of memory. It takes seriously the lived experience of those haunted by the reverberations of violent histories and offers a new lens through which the repercussions of collective transgenerational trauma can be identified. It names what is repeated and, as a result, it offers opportunities of processing the past while creating relational spaces to repair a seemingly broken future.
The lecture was ended with two practical elements to implement and foster the processing of transgenerational trauma. The first was what is known as “narrative repair”, in which she emphasised the importance of storytelling as a means of confronting and reconciling with the past. Through telling personal narratives, individuals and communities can engage in a repairing process, allowing for a more nuanced understanding of trauma and fostering empathy. For the second element, Gobodo-Madikizela emphasised empathy – even towards those who were once considered adversaries. By humanising individuals on both sides of historical conflicts, she suggests that collective healing process can begin, breaking the cycle of dehumanisation that perpetuates trauma across generations.
Applicability Beyond South Africa
While Gobodo-Madikizela’s lecture focussed on the present context of South Africa, her model holds promise for addressing transgenerational trauma in various contexts. In terms of research, this is especially true for Katya Tolstoj and her team of researchers and students in the FRT who are investigating (post-)Soviet theology within the scope of (post-)traumatic, (post-)totalitarian, and (post-)genocidal studies. In the case of the current war between Russia and Ukraine, it has become increasingly clear that unprocessed historical trauma lurks in the shadows of the violence. There is a great need to untangle the webs of traumatic memory in the various versions of history being propagated in these countries today.
Adapting Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela's model to (post-)Soviet trauma requires a thoughtful and context-specific approach. It involves creating an environment that promotes open dialogue, empathy, and a shared commitment to understanding and healing the wounds of the past. In the end, this model offers new opportunities for untangling and processing the historical trauma that is being played out in the present.