Trauma and War: The Psychological Implications for Survivor-victims in Iraqi Fiction

Abstract

War-time literature about Iraq reflects the terror and the trauma that the civilian population in Iraq have had to live with in recent years. As conflicts and wars overtook the country in a rapid fashion and the state’s hold weakened, the country plunged into total chaos. The infrastructure crumpled, the economy collapsed, and multiple rebel groups surfaced halting peace process in the country. The present paper examines the fictional text, The Sirens of Baghdad, to understand the civilian psychological trauma resulting from repeated wars on Iraqi soil. The gruesome deaths and uncertainty about country’s future have contributed to an overall feeling of dejection and apathy among the civilian population. This research paper concludes that the psychological trauma of the civilian population belies simple categorization like PTSD, and there is a need to determine the true scale of psychological damage suffered over years of exposure to terror.