AustLit

'Traumata, by Meera Atkinson, is an informed and passionate critique of patriarchy in a braided narrative, where the author’s life story is the weft woven through the warp (the formative structure) of patriarchal society. Atkinson’s weaving of her life story with theory that interprets patriarchy and its forms and deformities is powerful, for every experience and incident she relates is material for illuminating the traumatising influence of patriarchy; hence the plural title. Her self-exposure is searching, nakedly honest and compelling, but it is always in service of her intent, which is to create a three-dimensional picture of the society we are born into, deeply and generationally wounded by the institutionalised, polyphonic, medusa-headed curse of patriarchy. Atkinson has achieved this searching picture of the wounded culture into which we are born with great skill and a remarkable command of the many discourses that inform this deconstruction of ‘traumarchy,’ her word for the traumata caused by patriarchy.' (Introduction)