Psychosocial Notebook - IOM Publications - International ...
Psychosocial Notebook - IOM Publications - International ...
Psychosocial Notebook - IOM Publications - International ...
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army and police and denied or minimized the relevance of the presence of<br />
Serb paramilitary units in Kosovo can be read in all of its psychological,<br />
social and political relevance.<br />
The combination of these three dynamics, self-victimization, negation and<br />
conspiracy projection, might be considered both consistent with and sustaining<br />
the fantasy of moral perfection and superiority of a collective/<br />
narcissistic subject. By experiencing events in these terms, the narcissist<br />
subject can be seen as unconsciously trying to protect his or her own<br />
psychological equilibrium from the anxiety that emerged both from the<br />
collapse of a moral and cognitive order, and from the subconscious return<br />
of some repressed complexes, evoked by perturbing (uncanny) events and<br />
discourses present in the social and cultural field. In this light, it is important<br />
to underline that it is usually those people originating from a patriarchal<br />
rural environment (thus usually lacking continuative and prolonged<br />
social interaction with Albanians), who tend to be most vulnerable to the<br />
internalization and transmission of conspiracy theories and homogenous<br />
discourses of ethnic hatred. Urbanized people, who had experienced coexistence<br />
for a long time, tended to be less adamant in their rejection of<br />
responsibility, and less virulent in their demonization of the Albanian<br />
enemy.<br />
Having analysed the social and psychological implications of the use of<br />
narratives of conspiracy, denial and self-victimization in the social construction<br />
of meaning in relation to social antagonism and conflict, in the<br />
next section I will try to articulate the way these dynamics influence and<br />
shape the experience and understanding of suffering and healing as they<br />
are framed within Serb IDPs cultural horizon of daily experience.<br />
Sections D and E<br />
<strong>Psychosocial</strong> <strong>Notebook</strong>, Volume 2, October 2001<br />
In sections D and E, it was suggested that the interviewers discuss the following:<br />
D – Pathologizing life: coping strategies and the emergence of suffering in<br />
individual, familiar, generational, gender, and collective dimensions of<br />
life.<br />
E – Narratives and discourses of suffering and healing in relation to the<br />
sociocultural and historical environment.<br />
Questions were formulated, and answered thus:<br />
8 (d) Have you or any member of your family or any of your friends<br />
experienced distress?<br />
How has it been? What means have been used to cope with it?<br />
105