Space, Time and the Ethics of Graphic Wit(h)nessing: Rupert Bazambanza’s Smile through the Tears

Abstract

This article proposes a reading, through the lens of Bracha Ettinger’s theoretical notion of ‘wit(h)nessing,’ of Rupert Bazambanza’s Smile through the Tears as a graphic memoir that draws on the Rwandan historical archive to bear witness to the trauma of the Tutsi nation. I argue that while ‘wit(h)nessing’ performs a wide range of textual, literary, social, cultural, and political functions, a close analysis of the term also shows that it is the node through which Bazambanza draws on Rwandan history and public memory to excavate and reinterpret the 1994 Rwandan genocide, and remember the trauma of the Tutsi nation.