Paper short abstract:

Birangona is about survivor-led ethical guidelines to record testimonies of wartime sexual violence through a historically and archivally informed, intergenerational family story.

Paper long abstract:

Labonno (Labony) needs to do a school project on family memories of 1971, the Bangladesh War. When coming to ask her grandmother (Nanu/Rehana), she wakes the latter from one of her frequent nightmares. What follows is her grandmother’s narration of the history of ‘birangona’ (brave women), the term given by the Bangladesh government in 1971 to honour the women who had been raped during the war. Her mother, Hena, also tells her of the Oral History Project through which they tried to collect testimonies and the need for ethical guidelines. But hidden in these discussions of the guidelines Labonno discovers an intricate secret family history. What could that secret be? What would Labonno feel when she hears of that secret? What will Labonno do in the future about her family and the nation’s history? This film, guidelines and graphic novel (all in Bangla and English) can be used by those who record testimonies of sexual violence in conflict (researchers, human rights activists, feminists, lawyers, filmmakers, photographers, journalists, writers) and is based on Nayanika Mookherjee's book The Spectral Wound. Sexual Violence, Public Memories and the Bangladesh War of 1971 published in 2015 by Duke University Press. The graphic novel has received the 2019 Praxis award https://wapadc.org/2019-Praxis-Award