Yalou's Thesis draft

As archives are passed through generations, the beauty of trauma is traveling along them.

The thesis will cover the following topics:

• The meaning of inheriting something: Written from my own perspective and experience inheriting the archive of my grandmother.
• The meaning of generational repetition within my family archive: It will be connected to different archive materials, but also to behavior and with a look into a broader context.
• The meaning of generational trauma? And how it is alive within an archive.
• How music can be used as spoken text: It connects to one of the archive materials, my grandmother's music book.

What am I writing:

The thesis will open with my family archive, and all the topics/chapters within the thesis will be connected to the archival material from my family archive. So the thesis will be an exploration of the archive. I inherited the archive from my grandmother Evà, the mother of my mother. And most of the archive material that is in the family archive is about my grandmother Evà. This is also a connection to my graduation project, as my graduation project is about my grandmother Evà and how her past influences the present.

It starts with the meaning of inheriting an archive and it will cover questions as: What does our possessions say about us? What does it say about our past, present and future? How do I identify with my family archive? What are some of the important findings within my family archive? This chapter/topic will end with my realization of all the resemblance with the present and the past.

And that will lead me to the topic of repetition and with a focus on generational repetition and it will cover questions as: What is the meaning of repetition within family generations? How does this connect to historical repetition? And how do I see repetition within my family and the archive?

This chapter/topic will be a realization of the previous chapter. It will be about generational trauma and how this is not only passed through emotionally but also alive in family archives. This chapter will cover the meaning of generational trauma and how this is seen in my family archive. I will end this chapter with my grandmother's story and her traumatic childhood. Within this ending I will use archive material to make the meaning and visualization more clear.

And one of the important archive materials in my family archive is the piano music of my grandmother. Within my graduation project (the documentary about my grandmother Evà) the piano music of my grandmother plays a very important voice, her voice. But also within the thesis I will use music as a second way to write the thesis. So in the end there will be the thesis and there will be music that fits to the thesis.

So the last topic/question will be how to translate music into words or how to translate words into music? As my grandmother wrote a lot of letters and music, it is the closest I can get to her voice.

For this question I will start with the importance of music within my family and with my grandmother as a starting point. I want to write about the connections between music and the written language. And in this part I will explain how I wrote the music piece for the thesis and how you can read it.

So these are the issues that I want to explore. The final thesis will consist of two texts: One will be a written story in music (musical notation), what the story is about is yet to be discovered (this will be creative writing and non-linear). Second will be a linear research text (a long read) with my family archive as the base of the text , written in a more intimate, diary form.

The key issues

• My family archive (my family archive:  images, audio recording, video recording,  written pieces)

• Repetition
• Generational trauma

• Music (how it works a a voice)

Construction in chapters

Introduction:

An image of the family tree

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A letter written by my grandmother, where she tells about her life. This letter already exists, but I might want to add some more details to it (stories that I have been told about by my mother and uncle).

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I will finish the introduction with the introduction of my grandmothers archive and the text will be build on the findings within my grandmothers archive

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Images of the archive

Chapter 1:

The meaning of inheriting an archive.

Chapter 2:

The topic of repetition and with a focus on generational repetition.

Chapter 3:

With generational trauma and how this is not only passed through emotionally but also alive in family archives

Chapter 4:

How to translate music into words or how to translate words into music?

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This chapter is connected to the music piece that I will write for my thesis. So in this chapter I will also provide an explanation about the meaning of the music piece and how I wrote it.

Conclusion

The conclusion will some up my findings in connection to my family archive.

For now I want to end the thesis with a question to myself…

How do we become part of the past?

It is already in us.

Intro + Chapter 1

The introduction will be a letter from my grandmother. There are many letters, so I will search for the right fit and tone.

The letter you just read is your first meeting with my grandmother Éva. She passed away in 2003 at the age of 63. I remember the day she died. My mother took my brother and me to my grandmother's home in Tilburg. At that time, she lived in a recreational park surrounded by nature. When we arrived, she did not open the door when we knocked. My mother did not trust the situation, so she called the park's security and entered the house through the bedroom window. While my brother and I were still outside with the security guard, my mother found her mother on the floor. She had had a stroke. It was taking some time, so the security guard decided to go into the house with us; he had a key to the house. So we entered the house and then went into the bedroom. Where my mum squatted next to her mother while calling the ambulance…

I don't remember this moment.

My mother told me about it.

I do remember the ambulance and how big and bright it was.

My grandmother died later that day {date}

It was up to my mother to clean my grandmother's house after her passing. She started collecting precious elements from the house with my uncle. They created my grandmother's archive and divided it between the two of them.

So, do you see that plastic box in the middle of this empty field?

It is the archive, my grandmother's archive, that my mother shaped.

Before we dive into this plastic box, I want to introduce you to my family and the people who are part of this story.

(Image)

I will guide you to the plastic box and through the archive. To make sense of the thesis title and add a research base to my project.

You want me to open the plastic box? That is alright.

We are sitting in this open field.

(It feels nice to have this space, but there is a feeling of loneliness within the nothingness. You taught me to analyze my feelings, so whenever I feel lonely, panicky, or sad, I always look at it as if it is outside of my body. What did my grandmother do?

I slide the plastic box towards me, and I lift the lid of it.

We can now see what is in the box, which is a lot. So, let's take the time to look at all the elements and give them a place in this field. You knot at me, and we start spreading the archive….. >>> THE MEANING OF ARCHIVE.  

It starts with the meaning of inheriting an archive, and it will cover questions such as: What do our possessions say about us? What does it say about our past, present, and future? How do I identify with my family archive? What are some of the important findings within my family archive? This chapter/topic will end with realizing all the resemblances between the present and the past.