Abstract:
Memory, the agency of speech and the impossibility of forgetting traumatic experiences is
central towards the healing process of survivors of violence. Witnessing through narration,
although somewhat traumatizing and damaging in itself, is ironically therapeutic and the
only way towards coming to terms with a painful past. This article interrogates how memory
and remembering is not only a healing process for victims of abuse in an abusive state but
also as a strategy that John Ruganda uses to testify to/against a tyranny of the past in “The
Floods” to preserve a nation’ collective memory of repression in a violent political era.
