Genre: The confession

This text belongs to the testimonial genre. Testimonials are characterized by being accounts of personal experiences that give a version of events from the perspective of someone who directly experienced them. Those that give testimony assign responsibilities to others and assume their own responsibilities. Confessions are a special type of testimonial genre, in which the author assumes the majority of the responsibility for the events represented in the text. However, this genre can be manipulated in order to evade responsibilities, and this is precisely what occurs in Tróccoli’s text.

In addition to presenting himself in relation to the events, the author describes and evaluates the historical events that serve as a framework for his actions. Tróc- coli’s text combines the testimonial and historical genres. The construction of a historical account serves to reinforce hegemonic versions of the past in question. The text’s account of events is accompanied by argumentation in favor of the offi- cial version of history. The author’s argumentation attributes different degrees of meaning and relevance to different perspectives. History’s central discursive practice is the interpretation and construction of social experience using textual forms and linguistic resources belonging to narrative, explication, or argumentation as ways of positioning oneself and persuading the reader to accept the interpretation as truth or fact (Coffin 1997). The use of this rhetorical resource allows the author to construct a version of history that appears to be the logical consequence of events previously presented in the text. Tróccoli uses discursive strategies in the text in order to construct a historical memory that favors his position and the position of the group to which he belongs.

The text represents an instantiation of a social process, the testimonial that

includes a personal confession. 3 This social process develops in stages. A confession is a social practice carried out to reconstruct a past event. It is an admission of guilt, a secret, or a sin. The confessional genre is associated with the testimonial genre in that testimonials recount personal experiences that give a version of past events from the perspective of someone who directly experienced them. Those

3. According to Foucault (1978) the confession appears during the counter-reform when the Catholic Church begins to demand that sinners confess, not only revealing unacceptable actions but also their inappropriate thoughts. The confession is not only a question of saying what one has done and how it was done, but also of reconstruction around the events of the feelings, im- ages, desires, and pleasures that animated these acts. Therefore the confession is converted into

a “mode of production of the truth” (p. 58), and is a discursive ritual in which the speaking subject is also the subject of the utterance. Late in the 19th century the confession is secularized and is converted in part of the authorized discourse to gain admittance to the truth such as a therapeutic session or a psychiatric interview.

฀ What We Remember

that give testimony assign responsibilities to others and assume their own. It is for this reason that the confession can be considered as a special type of testimonial in which the author assumes the majority of the responsibility for the incidents represented in the text. In addition to presenting him/herself in relation to the events the author describes and evaluates the historical events that serve as a framework for his/her actions. Lexico-grammatically, confessions are characterized by the use of the indicative mode, the first person, reference to the narrator as a topic and the use of verbs that denote action, thoughts, or feelings considered reprehensible in the specific context (van Leeuwen 1993). However, this genre can be manipulated or mixed with others in order to evade responsibility. This is what occurs in the text analyzed in this chapter.

Although this text does not exactly follow the sections of a traditional confession with respect to argument form, the rhetorical patterns utilized and the man- ners of referring to topics and specific social agents make it possible to consider this text part of the confessional genre.

This text mixes and re-accentuates the confessional genre (Voloshinov 1973) in order to produce a different effect in the audience about the image of the confes- sor. The writer utilizes the structural and functional elements that characterize a confession in order to obtain the audience’s empathy. When faced with the impos- sibility of a social excuse one searches for a self-justification for a reprehensible action. One self-pardons without assuming any guilt. One searches for the empathy of the Other because one does not feel that he/she must be pardoned since there is nothing to be pardoned for. This is, according to Derrida (1998), the in-

credible contradiction of a confession 4 to demonstrate an absence of regret or sor- row for the act.

Table 1. Confession (genre analysis by functional constituents) 1. Introduction to the problem (fictional narration to present the problem)

2. Presentation/affirmation of the events (personal account of the historical events, confession) 3. Proof (personal anecdotes, emotional narrative, historical parallels) 4. Command (exhortation for reconciliation and rejection of the argument of the Other) 5. Confession (limitation of personal involvement and responsibility) 6. Warning (if the Others continue their argumentation there will be consequences) 7. Accusation (refutation of the Other’s point of view) 8. Recognition and resolution

4. The analysis of Derrida (1998) is based in The Confessions of Rousseau (1781).

Chapter 5. Individual memory 

Genre: The confession