Newton Bhabha Fund PhD Placement Grant 2020-21

The doctoral research seeks to address psychosocial concerns of the disadvantaged group of youth from socially and economically deprived countries of Asia through analysis of trauma narratives. It examines the representations of trauma symptoms and the process of working-through it in trauma narratives for children, adolescents and young adults from Syria and Palestine. The proposed research for Newton-Bhabha Fund PhD Placement programme plans to analyse the approach to healing and recovery by youth in war and trauma narratives to frame a comprehensive study of the survival strategies employed by youth in emergencies. The research contributes to the expansion of knowledge on trauma due to external factors such as war, displacement, migration and violence by examining the understudied sites of suffering.

The PhD research is based within the theoretical framework of psychoanalysis, studying the customs of mourning, working-through trauma and recovery among distressed youngsters. For this study, four contemporary young adult novels have been selected as primary sources addressing the political upheaval, war and the subsequent migration of population from Syria and Palestine. Through these novels, the research analyses the behavioural patterns of the suffering children and adolescents along the lines of trauma theory, memory studies and postcolonial studies. It examines how children deal with mental health issues in their everyday lives during emergencies and disasters, and provides a comprehensive knowledge of survival among distressed youth.