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Psychology of War 1st Edition Eduardo Manuel Alvarez
Digital Instant Download
Author(s): Eduardo Manuel Alvarez; Arturo José Escobar
ISBN(s): 9781619423176, 1619423170
Edition: 1
File Details: PDF, 4.12 MB
Year: 2012
Language: english
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 PSYCHOLOGY OF EMOTIONS, MOTIVATIONS AND ACTION

PSYCHOLOGY OF WAR
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

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 PSYCHOLOGY OF EMOTIONS,
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 PSYCHOLOGY OF EMOTIONS, MOTIVATIONS AND ACTIONS

PSYCHOLOGY OF WAR

EDUARDO MANUEL ALVAREZ

AND
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

ARTURO JOSÉ ESCOBAR

EDITORS

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Psychology of war / editors, Eduardo Manuel Alvarez and Arturo Josi Escobar.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN:  (eBook)
1. Children and war. 2. Child psychology. 3. Psychic trauma in children. 4. War--
Psychological aspects. I. Alvarez, Eduardo Manuel. II. Escobar, Arturo Josi.
HQ784.W3P78 2012
362.88--dc23
2011045802

Published by Nova Science Publishers, Inc. † New York

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 CONTENTS

Preface vii
Chapter 1 "We Want No More War": Political Polarization
and Democratic Consciousness in a Group
of Venezuelan Children 1
Alejandra Sapene
Chapter 2 Children’s Psychological Distress and Needs in
Northern Uganda’s Conflict Zone: An Assessment
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

of Stakeholders’ Conflicting Engagements 33

Grace Akello, Annemiek Richters, Ria Reis
and Charles B. Rwabukwali
Chapter 3 The Psychology of Heroes: Antecedents and
Consequences of Combat-decorated War Heroism 63
Brian Wansink, and Koert van Ittersum
Chapter 4 Disorganization of the Collective Envelopes and
the Breaking-in of the Ego of the Child in the
Experience of War (Lebanon – July/August 2006) 93
Léla Chikhani-Nacouz, Hélène Issa,
and Mounir Chalhoub
Chapter 5 Jewish Children Hidden in France between 1940
and 1944: Their Psychic Construction 115
Marion Feldman
Index 131

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 PREFACE

This book presents current research in the psychology of war. Topics

discussed in this compilation include psychosocial processes of a group of
children in an experimental situation of political polarization and war;
children's psychological distress and needs in Northern Uganda's conflict zone;
antecedents and consequences of combat-decorated war heroism;
disorganization of the collective envelopes of the child in the experience of
war and the psychic construction of Jewish children hidden in France during
the Holocaust.
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Chapter 1- This research describes the psychosocial processes of a group

of children in an experimental situation of political polarization and war,
framed within the area of political social psychology. It was conducted with a
group of children, aged between 11 and 2 years old of middle social-economic
status, in the city of Caracas, Venezuela.
A game situation was designed, in which, through dramatization of a
fictional situation, the researcher presented the children a situation of
polarization, and then divided them in two groups. This investigation was
made in 7 sessions, and each one of them lasted one hour. In these sessions,
the children were divided in groups and made activities designed to understand
the psychosocial effects generated by the game situation and reflect upon these
effects.
Chapter 2- During the prolonged armed conflict in Northern Uganda, the
state through its Uganda People’s Defence Force (UPDF) and non-
governmental organisations (NGOs) were based in the conflict zone to protect
and promote psychosocial well-being of the civilians.
Nevertheless people in this region continued to be exposed to dangers of
wartime and psychosocial suffering. This chapter seeks to assess the

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 viii Eduardo Manuel Alvarez and Arturo José Escobar

conflicting roles played by the state and NGOs, also called humanitarian
agencies in the prevention and alleviation of psychological distress. While the
authors address this issue, children’s perspectives about suffering, distress,
survival and lack of appropriate care will constitute their main empirical
evidence. The field data provided in this chapter are based on one year of
ethnographic fieldwork in Gulu district in 2004-2005. The doctoral research
focused on experiences of displaced children aged 8-16 years, including ex-
combatants, who had fled to a relatively safer Gulu municipality from the
districts of Gulu, Kitgum and Pader. Additional informants included teachers,
camp leaders, NGO coordinators, nurses, counselors, and medical doctors. The
field data are complemented by data derived from literature review.
Chapter 3- Which soldier in a platoon is most likely to be a future hero? A
unique, proprietary survey of 526 World War II combat veterans shows two
distinct profiles of combat-decorated veterans. While both rate highly on three
common personality characteristics – leadership, loyalty, and risk-taking – the
strength of these dimensions vary between those who were eager to enlist
(eager heroes) versus those who were drafted or otherwise reluctant to enlist
(reluctant heroes). While one might look more like John Wayne in The Green
Berets, the second looks more like Tom Hanks in Saving Private Ryan. These
findings offer two key contributions. Conceptually, these profiles in heroism
can help us better understand leadership in crisis situations. Operationally,
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

these profiles may aid recruiters of future soldiers – along with fire fighters,
police officers, and rescue workers – by knowing what characteristics in
potential employees might best reflect the potential for heroic leadership. They
also offer insights as to how training can develop heroic potential.
Chapter 4- The objective of this study is to analyze the effects of the
disorganization of collective envelopes (deficit of social time, of socialization,
of group memory, of a common future, etc.) on the psychological envelopes
supporting the organization of time, space, thought, memory and dream in the
child.
The study proposes that war in itself is not the cause of the child’s trauma,
but rather the destruction of the social envelopes, and in particular the de-
structuring of the symbolic. When the anxiety of the present is what
determines the future, when space-time dimensions are in chaos, when the
social field is fraught with turbulence, what happens to the child?
Using semi-structured clinical interviews with 30 Lebanese children aged
9 to 13 years old (who were 6 to 10 years old during the 2006 conflict)
exhibiting post-war symptoms, the authors have analyzed the disruption of

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 Preface ix

certain collective envelopes, namely, temporality, cultural space and cross

generational encystment.
Chapter 5- In 1991, the first international meeting of Jewish children
hidden in Europe during World War II is organized in New York. Before this
event, the psychology literature use to talk about survivors, mainly adults
survivors of the Holocaust. A few studies concerning children survivors of the
Holocaust, and more specifically hidden children appeared only in the 90’,
forty seven years after the Liberation. The aim of this chapter is to show the
impact of collective history on individual history: the experience of Jewish
children hidden in France and who stayed in France following Liberation. A
series of semi-structured interviews on personal and psychological history was
conducted with 35 Jewish people, (21 women, 14 men; mean age of 74.9
years, range: 65-82 years), living in France and who had been hidden between
1940 and 1944 during the Occupation in France. Using a qualitative
methodology, the author identifies specific traumas, intra- and inter-
generational family disorders and affiliation disturbances, and, alongside this,
protective factors and ways of coping with the trauma. This study considers
the specific and complex situation of the Jewish children hidden in France,
who presents specific features in their psychic construction.
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 In: Psychology of War ISBN: 978-1- 61942-312-1
Editors: E. Alvarez and A. Escobar ©2012 Nova Science Publishers, Inc.

Chapter 1

"WE WANT NO MORE WAR":

POLITICAL POLARIZATION
AND DEMOCRATIC CONSCIOUSNESS
IN A GROUP OF VENEZUELAN CHILDREN

Alejandra Sapene
“Andres Bello” Catholic University, Caracas, Venezuela
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

ABSTRACT
This research describes the psychosocial processes of a group of
children in an experimental situation of political polarization and war,
framed within the area of political social psychology. It was conducted
with a group of children, aged between 11 and 2 years old of middle
social-economic status, in the city of Caracas, Venezuela.
A game situation was designed, in which, through dramatization of a
fictional situation, the researcher presented the children a situation of
polarization, and then divided them in two groups. This investigation was
made in 7 sessions, and each one of them lasted one hour. In these
sessions, the children were divided in groups and made activities
designed to understand the psychosocial effects generated by the game
situation and reflect upon these effects.
Results indicate that the gender of participants affects the
consequences of political polarization and war. The concepts of war and
conflict, and leadership building within conflictive polarization situation,
as well as the offensive weapons chosen during the conflict, were some of

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 2 Alejandra Sapene

the observed phenomena during this investigation. Thus, it started a

process of political polarization, distinguished by the forming of a group
identity, recognition and identification with the leader and
disqualification of the unaligned. It also generated a process of political
“depolarization”, as a way of rejecting the war situation. The reflective
aspects of the intervention changed the behavior of the group, promoting
and raising awareness through interactions based on respect and tolerance
among participants, and rejecting war and polarization. The change in
participants was analyzed with detail due to the registering (sound
recording and observation) of each session; and these results were also
corroborated by the significant adults involved in the activity, and by
external adults as well.

RESEARCH CONTEXT
Between May and June 2006 I carried out a research about political
polarization in children, in Caracas, capital city of Venezuela, where I live.
Since his election in 1998, and from the beginning of his government,
President Hugo Chavez (HC) has fostered an atmosphere of political
polarization marked by the frequent use in his speech, of threatening phases
(Montero, 2003) that have become part of everyday life. At the same time,
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

opposition groups have made continuous alerts about the communist danger,
as well as the immediate possibility of a democratic break followed by a
dictatorial regime. Moreover, his main contender during the 1998 elections,
Irene Sáez, accused candidate HC of still having blood on his hands because of
the deaths that happened during the failed coup d’Etat he led in 1992. During
the electoral campaign; the political atmosphere was already beginning to be
polarized, showing a clear division between the adversaries and the followers
of Lieutenant Colonel Chavez.

Origins of the Political Polarization in Venezuela

Following his election in 1998, President Hugo Chavez first year in office
was marked by an atmosphere full of expectation in which an important sector
of the population explicitly decided to support his political project. But the
most evident break point in terms of social polarization occurred at the
beginning of 2001. In that year, a social movement, associated with political
opposition groups, started to publicly protest against a Decree proposed by the

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 "We Want No More War" 3

Minister of Education. That Decree mentioned the government’s control over

the schools. A description can be seen in the note published by a main
Venezuelan journal, with national coverage, about those protests:

Even though the pretext was to deliver the educational law project written
by the civil society, thousands of parents – in their majority middle class
mothers and members of private schools communities – took advantage
to express, in front of the Legislative Palace, seat of the National
Assembly, their disagreement with the Decree 1011 and manifested their
fear towards the “students indoctrination and the schools’ cubanisation’”
(El Nacional. Retrieved July 20, 2007. In: http://www.el-Nacional.com
/especiales/findeano2001/enero/1011.asp )

Consequently, a series of social conflicts started. The main manifestations

were two strikes (2001, 2002) summoned both by industrial entrepreneurs and
coalitions of labor Unions (FEDECAMARAS and Venezuelan Workers
Confederation, respectively), along with other political and social groups.
Their protest concluded in an opposition march against President Hugo
Chavez’ government on April 11, 2002, which ended after snipers killed 19
people.
Such facts led to the strongest crisis Chavez’ government had to face so
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

far, forcing him out of office for 40 h. This event, as the previous ones, was
marked by the two polarized views that have dominated this conflict. Social
discord achieved a new peak at the end of 2002, when the opposition
movements convoked a second indefinite strike that had a strong effect over
the country’s oil production. The president’s response was the massive
dismissal of all of the oil national enterprise’s (PDVSA) workers. In 2003 the
opposition began demanding a recalling referendum, a constitutional right.
This was made by way of signatures for the demand, providing all
identification data of the signers. Such data were taken by the chavist 11
deputy L. Tascón. The so-called “Tascón List” has been used since 2004 as an
instrument of exclusion, since it is used as criterion to define the political
tendency of the citizens, and decide about their acceptation or rejection for
public office. It is also used to allocate funds and aids, as well as any other
procedures in which the national government has any saying (Goncalves &
Gutierrez, 2005). To date there has not been anything that could stop the

1
Designation given to the followers and the militants of the official party supporting HC.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 4 Alejandra Sapene

discriminatory process generated by the “Tascón List” and a later one: the
“Maisanta List,” of the same type, produced in 2005.
The political polarization process in Venezuela is expressed by the
division of the population into two poles: Chavistas or “officialists” and
opposition or escualidos (scraggy, emaciated, in Spanish). Systematic
confrontations have occurred between both groups as a product of the rejection
that both feel for one another. Based on this context I decided to do this
research.

POLARIZATION
The verb to polarize alludes to the action of concentrating attention or
intention on something – an idea, a person, or an object. Polarization leads to
the fixation of attention on one direction, loosing sight of the diversity that can
exist in the context (Montero, 2002). By pulling toward the extremes,
polarization simplifies reality in order to achieve predetermined ends in social
circles. Thus, polarization reduces and impoverishes social complexity by
decreasing options, since it excludes any other possibility that is different from
the identifying pole. Polarization includes the phenomena of exclusion,
segregation, estigmatization, and sectarianism.
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Martín-Baró (1990a) pointed out that intolerance to accept and understand

other ideological positions different from one’s own opinions takes place in
polarization. Difference is experienced as a menace that has to be eliminated,
denied, or avoided in a private and collective context. In this sense, pressure is
generated, not only on the citizens, but also on the diverse social institutions so
they would align themselves with one pole or the other. This alienated vision
of reality takes over social spaces, forcing people to construct a version of
reality based on a unique view that defines their values, believes, attitudes,
affections, among other psychological processes.
Social polarization acts upon the collective world of the social actors
exerting an important influence on their actions and on decision making at an
individual and collective level. It is, furthermore, a splitting strategy that can
be used effectively when certain political leaders exercise their power. When
this occurs we refer to political polarization, alluding to politicians’ tendency
to induce phenomena and political situations, excluding any option different to
the one they are promoting (Montero, 2002).
Political polarization has been broadly employed by authoritarian regimes,
with the determination to suppress any opinion that would differ from the

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 "We Want No More War" 5

leaders’. This process of attributing all those negative and dangerous aspects to
the “other” progressively legitimates the employment of explicit and implicit
violence destined to eradicate the “other,” maintaining a social order only
convenient for the dominating pole (Lozada, 2004).
In polarized situations, the person leading the political process makes use
of a speech to promote society’s political polarization and constructs an
ideology that unites his/her followers. This system of “unique” ideas seeks to
have people who sympathize with the regime act, think, and feel in
consonance with the leader’s ideology. This guarantees the uniformity of
thought as well as the irreproachable character of the “leader’s commands.”
Therefore, a person who wishes to be part of this social group has to submit in
an unreflective way to the ideas that reign in the leader. Hence, any person
who defers from the dominating group’s beliefs will be labeled as “enemy.” In
the process of polarization, the relation with the “other” is marked with the
necessity of permanently demonstrating the power and the supremacy one
exerts. This is a form of defense from the danger and the threat that the other
represents. Therefore, pugnacity is a characteristic that is usually present in
polarization. Confrontation and conflict are always latent and they tend to be
necessary, since they enhance solidarity and cohesion of each and every group.
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

CONSEQUENCES ON MENTAL HEALTH

The concept of mental health should be understood as a global state where
the person is influenced permanently by the social relationships. It is pertinent
to highlight this point, since political polarization can substantially affect the
person’s global health state, because it goes against the capacity of the person
to establish positive relationships and encounters with the others, thereby
translating its influence into physical and psychological disorders.
Sawaia (1998) defines health as the capacity that the body and mind have
to be in movement, affecting each other through good encounters. She
enumerates a series of conditions essential for health. Among them is the
capacity to reflect upon oneself; and the ability to feel, identify, and
understand one’s own emotions as well as those of the others. That is
considered an essential condition to establish positive relationships with
others. Sawaia also introduces a political element to her definition, by
claiming that in order for a person to be healthy he/she needs to efficiently
communicate with others, as well as to have “personal democracy.” This refers
to the capacity of making decisions and taking responsibility for them, as well

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 6 Alejandra Sapene

as respecting the others for what they are, and letting them have their own
space for self-expression. For Sawaia, health is the possibility to have hope
and convert that hope into action.
Through the concept of health, specifically defined in this way, it is
possible to introduce elements such as individual responsibility for one’s
health and also the state’s role regarding public health. As Sawaia (1998) says:
“Health is the indicator of the (non)commitment with human suffering on
behalf of the government, the masses and the individual.” (p. 56)
Given that in polarization repression and abuse of power take place, it is
important to introduce the political actors’ (government, political parties, and
such) responsibility regarding the population’s health quality. The feeling of
exclusion that is enacted during polarization generates emotional reactions in
people, which affect their lives. Therefore, it is necessary to introduce the term
“ethical–political suffering,” which is defined as the way the individual is
treated and treats other people in social relations (Sawaia, 1998). Martín-Baró
(1990a) emphasized the importance of not labeling as pathological the effects
caused by the chronic social circumstances. Historic, cultural, and political
realities are displaced as well as the experience of political violence. In this
sense, Martín-Baró alluded to a “psychosocial trauma” when referring to those
experiences that affect individuals, and above all, the population as a
collective. He also claimed that when a person undergoes a pathological
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

diagnosis without executing a psychosocial analysis of the phenomenon, the

collectivity and the individual tend to be victimized, and “theoretical” violence
is exerted upon them.

CONSEQUENCES FOR CHILDREN

Ethical and Political Dilemmas

The consequences of polarization and political violence affect children as

well as adults. However, growing up in an environment where a unique mode
of thinking is promoted as the right way to think, and where total identification
with one group is demanded, can generate deep changes that affect cognitive,
moral, and socioemotional development. Researchers in Chile (Lira, 1991) and
El Salvador (Martín- Baró, 1990a ; Punamäki, 1990) studied the consequences
that children have to face when living in situations of war or political
repression, discovering that in such circumstances people are encouraged, by
those in power, to adopt positions of clear and absolute identification with one

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 "We Want No More War" 7

of the groups in conflict. Thus, they try to project themselves from some of the
repressive actions that the government or the oppressive group could exert
against them.
Martín-Baró (1990b) stated that children growing up in the context of war
in El Salvador had to face existential dilemmas that would not be considered
“normal” or expected for their age if they had lived in a different situation.
Political conceptions affected their lives by influencing their daily decisions,
such as their election of friends, topics of conversation, interests, among other
aspects. This submitted them to an environment of continuous tension that
affected their way of living. Furthermore, he affirmed that children who live in
a war situation have to face three basic existential dilemmas: Action-flight,
identity-alienation, and polarization-rupture. Moreover, he explained that there
are two forms in which children can get involved in a war: by taking part of it
or by being its victims. In El Salvador it was common that children ended up
joining the armed forces as child soldiers. There they were instructed to define
the people from the opposite side as “the enemy” that had to be attacked. They
were reared within a polarized vision of the “other” and learned that violence
was the medium to confront it. Risking their lives in the attempt to eradicate
the “other” was considered one of the greatest ideals of heroism.
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The Action-Flight Dilemma

In situations of political polarization, victimized children are invaded by

fear and horror, experiencing impotence and deprivation in an environment
where violence does not represent power, but rather destruction. For them,
everything related to the military represented a constant threat, since it was a
symbol of death and a social rejection of their presence in the world. In this
situation the victimized child has no other recourse but fleeing from violence.
Martín-Baró (1990b) describes an escape of a psychical nature, when referring
to the children who had a more privileged economic position, and who could
grow up surrounded by walls that could isolate them from the reality of war
that devastated El Salvador. Although this author did not consider this fact in
itself negative, he thought that the way these children received information
was unconstructive, since usually their significant adults mediated the
information by transmitting the facts through a filter. This filter was regularly
slanted by polarization, repressed anxiety, outspoken hatred, and
discriminatory kindness that hindered a personal vision that could actually be
understood by children.

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Another dilemma that children encounter is the one produced between

identity-alienation, which appears when they have to confront their primary
socialization processes in a context essentially determined by violence,
political stigmatization, dehumanized social relationships and institutionalized
lies, among other aspects. These children’s identities begin to form themselves
in a context of generalized violence, where they find themselves forced to
choose between a socially stigmatized identity and an imposed one, the latter
leading them to quit their personal democracy by unreflectively accepting
what it is supposed to be correct.
Lira (1991) considers that fear does not only occur because of the dread to
become the victim of an attack, but also occur due to the anxiety of being
labeled as an enemy by the opposite social sector, since this would produce a
situation of constant suspicion. The “other,” far from being seen as someone
who could help growth and development, is perceived as a potential danger.
This idea becomes clear to those people who have to live in a political
environment where the prevailing power considers them as enemies or as
probable supporters of the enemy. In an environment where politics invade
daily lives, people reject any sort of political opinion or expression as a way to
protect themselves of any impact that the stigmatization of their ideas might
have. People desire to have a political identity, however, the consequences that
this could have on their daily relationships are so harmful that they prefer to
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abandon it. This generates a feeling of lack of authenticity toward themselves

and of guilt toward their abandoned friends.
Subjectively, the renounce or abandonment of a political identity
considered wanted, but socially stigmatized, creates a feeling of lack of
authenticity toward oneself and guilt toward the abandoned friends; but, in
case of assuming this wanted identity it is necessary to take the objective risk
of repression and subjective fear, such as a feeling of guilt toward one’s own
family, endangered because of this personal political opinion (Martín-Baró,
1990b, p. 244).
Such a situation presents the child with life options that surpass his/her
personal resources as well as the regular challenges for his/her development.
The natural dynamic in contexts of repression and war cause a negative impact
on children’s mental health. Their situation is complex, since assuming a
position that contradicts the imposed social system generates objective and
subjective costs that can lead them to give up their political identity.
The polarization-rupture dilemma is related to the previous one. The
confronting groups make clear efforts to win the “unconditional” sympathy of
the uncompromised population. Pressure is generated to support a group in an

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unconditional way, “absolutely” rejecting the other. This stimulates children to

structure their mind in dichotomized terms, allowing limited tolerance for
ambiguity, as well as a type of convergent and unique thought, which prevents
the creative capacity and the possibility to see reality from diverse points of
view (Martín-Baró, 1990b).
This restriction of thought inhibits the possibility to use words as a
medium to understand and symbolize reality. Words allow generating
possibilities for action and forms of conflict resolution that can be mediated
through verbal resources, which promote the use of nonviolent strategies to
solve problems. Regarding the process of emotional over-involvement and
restriction of the cognitive horizon, the use of words as a channel of
expression is restricted and invaded by the prevailing speech, which
oversimplifies the vision of the world. This can lead to the use of violent
actions as a response to the “possible” threat that the “other” represents, or
occasionally, can also lead to the somatization or development of
psychological disorders as a result of the incapacity to deal with tension
(Martín-Baró, 1990b).

EMOTIONAL REACTIONS OF CHILDREN

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Children under situations of repression or war which are marked by

political polarization, tend to present responses of fear, anxiety, and
aggression. Usually, aggression occurs as a response to experimented fear or
frustration. Although, when the object of aggression is considered too
powerful, fear dominates the emotions and the behavior.
Regarding aggression, it is important to understand how the naturalization
of violence in contexts of political polarization not only supports it but
also promotes it. A pacific development is usually stimulated when the
child grows up in a context allowing him/her to control his/her impulses.
During war and conflictive situations the child grows familiarized
with destruction, violence, and hostility, which are accepted by adults. As
long as cruelty, violence, and threats appear in the environment, it
will be difficult for the child to develop the ability to self-control his/her own
feelings of anger. Violence is naturalized in such a way that the necessary
guilt is not developed in order for the child to feel the need to repair the
aggression, once it is exerted. Due to the pressure generated by conflict,
the child can go back to previous stages of his/her development, where
aggression is manifested in a disproportionate way in comparison to what

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it is expected for children in their age (Freud & Burlingham, 1943, quoted by
Punamäki, 1990)
In a context of political conflict, with polarization, and especially in war,
it is difficult to find the positive effects that extreme situations like these can
generate.
Nevertheless, the concept of resilience as tolerance of pain and pressure,
and the ability that some people have to come out stronger from traumatic
situations that would surpass their personal resources (Barudy & Dantagnan,
2005; Cyrulnik, 2002) can explain how a traumatic situation can be coped
with. Punamäki (1990) points out that certain victims of war situations tend to
develop a major inner control, politically committing to a cause, as well as
having bigger expressions of altruistic behavior and expressing solidarity to
others, which are not stimulated values of the dominating system in times of
peace.

IMPACT OF POLITICAL POLARIZATION

ON PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE

The situation described at the beginning of this chapter illustrates the

influence that the sociopolitical situation has had on my work as a
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psychologist. Since 2001, I have been attending as many events as possible

about political polarization. In most psychotherapeutic or psychoeducational
interventions I have carried out, the children have made allusions to the
political situation, even if sometimes it was unrelated to the activity they were
doing at that moment. The frequency or intensity of such interventions
depended on the historical moment in which we have been living. For this
reason, subjects related to the “chavistas” or to the “escualidos” (designated
name given to the opposition sector) have been very present in my daily work.
But I have also been able to observe that the more the time passes the
more the subject has become a taboo, not only for children, but also for me. In
recent opportunities, when someone mentions Venezuelan politics, the
children tend to inhibit their opinions. The difference in political perspectives
has caused a large fracture in society. When a person believes in a political
idea different from that of another group in a polarized society, he/she tends to
be an object of exclusion and repeated aggressions caused by the “enemy.”
The topic of polarization has limited the possibility for dialog and coexistence
between Venezuelans, and in a way it authorizes the use of disqualifiers when

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referring to the people from the opposite side. For this reason, the children
tend to evade the subject in order to avoid any conflict, and achieve the
activities’ objectives.
Political polarization appears in my work through multiple forms. It
becomes more difficult to elude everyday. As a subject of differentiation it is
manifested through questions such as: “Are you “chavista”? “escuálida”? (10-
year old boy, Psychotherapeutic section), or comments such as: “In my family
my dad doesn’t talk to my uncle because he is “chavista” (8-year-old boy from
a cooperative learning group)2, or “If you don’t do what I tell you I’m going to
tell Chavez” (9-year-old boy from the cooperative learning group) or “What
happens is that escualidos want to destroy the chavistas” (9-year-old boy from
a cooperative learning group). Paradoxically, even if it is an avoided subject,
national politics invade my professional life constantly. That has led me to
have deep conversations with my work colleagues about the possible ways of
studying and understanding this phenomenon. We have reached several
conclusions, such as interpreting these expressions as a possible resistance
against our work, or as mistrust or aggression against the bond with the
therapist. Most mportantly, we have acknowledged the relevance of the role
that these children are playing regarding the construction of national reality.
This phenomenon seems to be embraced by people, and is used as a strategy to
obtain benefits, as has also happened in El Salvador and Chile (Lira, 1991;
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Martín-Baró, 1990a).
Polarization creates a situation of chronic tension in the population.
Feelings of discomfort are generated, which are a product of the anger felt
against the rival and also the fear and mistrust produced by the anticipation of
possible negative consequences by expressing any political position that
opposes collective expectations. The phenomenon of political polarization
directly affects interpersonal relationships, which represent an essential
component of the individual and collective psychological wellbeing.

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE RESEARCH

The research I conducted was set out to describe emotional and cognitive
reactions in a situation of political polarization. It involved a group of 25

2
This group of cooperative learning is a type of psychoeducational intervention employed by the
Service of School Psychology in the Psychology Unit of the Social Park “Father Manuel
Aguirre, S.J.”

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children, between 11 and 12 years old, students of the fifth grade (grammar
school); belonging to social economic levels C and D (clerks, labourers, and
poor, but with work) of the Venezuelan population.
The research design combines elements from explicative methods
(Matalon, 1988), such as creating a quasiexperimental situation that could
reflect the conditions of polarization present in Venezuelan society, with
participatory action research. The researcher created the conditions to
reproduce a polarized situation within an environment (a school room)
externally controlled by aspects such as time, place, and working conditions
regulated by the school norms.
At the same time, participatory action research was introduced through the
procedure of reflection–action–reflection (Freire, 1970) and the participants
being able to introduce their points of view by reflecting upon their life
experiences while changing the initial situation. This research design is what
Montero (2006) has called participatory experimental intervention, which
does not attempt to control what the participants do, but instead tries to
generate a process of problematization that produces changes in
consciousness, by introducing a condition where the children could face a
situation that is a metaphor of something happening in their daily lives.
These activities were guided by ethical norms protecting the psychological
integrity of the children. First, their parents were approached in order to
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obtain their written and informed authorization allowing their children

to participate in the experience. Before this took place, those parents
were invited to a meeting where they were informed about what I wanted
to carry out and, about their right to be informed of what would be
happening during the action-research sessions. Suggestions given by
some parents were included. Also there were no judgments or criticism
of political opinions given by the children participants. There were
weekly revisions of session transcriptions, in order to spot any comment
or deed that could be significant or that suggested any type of
political inclination in the researcher’s behavior.
Moreover, I took care to ensure the anonymity of the children participants,
of the teachers’, and of the school. Last, after finishing the intervention, I held
a meeting with the subprincipal, the school counselor, and the teachers of the
fifth grade and sixth grade (this one was going to be the next teacher for those
children). They were informed about the results obtained and given
recommendations derived from them.
I planned a playful situation, in which the group’s polarization was
induced through the dramatization of a children story called Children Don’t

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Want War 3 (Battut, 2002). This dramatization was carried out both by the
children and the researchers (an assistant and I). The selection of this book was
based on several reasons; the main one being its plot, since it portrays a
situation of political polarization that leads to a war. This text illustrates in a
clear way the causes and the consequences of polarization, by stressing how
the leaders and the people’s decisions influenced the origin of the conflict. It
also shows how following a leader can be sometimes irrational and illogical,
leading to actions that contradict people’s personal thoughts and feelings.
Moreover, the story uses the absurd element as an instrument that
problematizes and promotes awareness about the use of violence. Furthermore,
it emphasizes the role that children play in a context of polarization and war,
highlighting their feelings, thoughts, and actions in this circumstance, which
causes the participants’ identification with the characters of the story. Finally,
the story has images that clearly represent the process of polarization as well
as its consequences, which is useful and pertinent when trying to understand
the story. The use of images helps to understand the message and at the same
time reduces the possibility that children’s reading capacity could be a variable
interfering in the comprehension of the text. The group of children was
divided into two “kingdoms”: a blue one and a red one (as in the story). The
children could freely choose their group. All the girls and two boys went to the
blue kingdom. The red kingdom had only boys.
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But there was a participant who did otherwise. A boy who created his own
kingdom: the yellow kingdom. His capacity to reaffirm himself allowed him to
break from the beginning the polarization and assume a sensible and
independent position in this process. However, his election had an individual
cost, since he became an object of frequent attacks against the difference he
represented. By establishing that difference he became a target for
disqualifications related to his weakness, given that he was alone in his
kingdom. His kingdom was considered “poor.”
Based on this situation a series of activities where made that helped
understand and think about the cognitive and emotional reactions caused by
political polarization (see Table 1). The children spontaneously established
connections between the activities and Venezuela’s present sociopolitical
situation.

3
The plot is about how two kings, who used to be friends, start a war because each one makes
fun of the other, when a passing bird drops excrement on his nose. Despite their friendship
they start a war, which causes mutual damage to their countries and their people, dragging
them into an absurd fight.

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Table 1. Activities during experimental situation.

1st session Objectives Activity

-Encourage the knowledge of 1) Doing “Presentation card activity”
personal characteristics of the Discussion with the children.
members of the group. 2) Creating norms with the participants.
-Construct a series of rules that
could favor the coexistence in the
group.
2nd session -Introduce the story Children 1) Reading the first part of the story
Don’t Want War (Battut, 2001) Children Don’t Want War (Battut, 2001).
-Encourage a sensitive approach 2) Discussion of the story.
towards war and polarization 3) Selection of the colors of the kingdoms
situations. to which the children wish to be part of.
3rd session -Lead the children to think about 1) Draw the elements related to the
the characteristics of the kingdom kingdom to which they belong (food,
to which they are part of. weapons, cars, houses, families, etc). To
do so they could only use the color they
chose for their kingdom.
2) Each group has to gather all drawings
on a bond paper, in order to give a sense
of unity to the characteristics of their
kingdom.
4th session -Make the participants think 1) Each group has to expose its opinion
about the perceptions that each about the characteristics of the opposite
group has of the other. group.
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-Contrast the impressions the 2) Each group has to show to the opposite
children have of the opposite group the drawings they made in the 3rd
group with the characteristics it Session, which represent the
has in reality. characteristics of their kingdom.
5th session - Encourage the children to think 1) Written activity about Children Don’t
about the disadvantages of war Want War
-Let the participants identify the 2) Reading the last part of the story.
feelings that a situation of war
yields in them.
-Allow the participants to
generate solutions that help solve
the conflict.
6th session -Let the participants establish 1) Reflections about possible connections
connection between the situation that the children establish between the
of war created on class and their war situation generated in class and their
daily life. daily life.
- Motivate children to relate the 2) Motivate the children to establish
polarization generated by war (in possible connections between a series of
the story) to polarization in photographs projected on a wall and the
Venezuela. war situation lived in class. The
photographs have images related to
polarization situations in Venezuela

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7th session -Encourage the children to do an 1) The children have to fill out a survey
evaluation of the activity. that allows evaluating the actitivity.
-Motivate the children to 2) Construction of the Peace Tree:
construct a symbol of what peace The children have to write on a piece of
means to them. paper a word that explains what they
should do in order to avoid war. These
little pieces of paper will be put on the
branches of a tree that is draw on the wall.
The pieces of paper represent the leaves
of the tree.
3) Snaks.

ETHICAL PRINCIPLES OF THE INVESTIGATION

In this investigation ethical aspects were basic. They were the following:
As this kind of activities may have an indoctrination effect on children, I made
sure there was no such effect. For this, various precautions were taken. One of
them was to discuss and clarify my political position as well as that of my co-
worker’s (assistant) before initiating the investigation. This helped diminish
the probability of introducing elements that could favor any pole of society in
our interventions.
A second aspect was the recording and transcription of the work sessions,
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that were discussed and revised by an external supervisor (Maritza Montero)

and me. This allowed us to follow the interventions and identify on time some
elements that could have an influence or even generate negative aspects for the
children. Also, we respected every child’s opinion regarding social and
political events. They had the right, not only to have a different opinion, but
also to abstain or withdraw from the intervention if they wanted to. The goal
was to promote voluntary participation, trying that our function facilitated,
guided and assisted the group’s process, making sure never to predispose a
speech that was pro or against any political position.
On the other hand, given the characteristics that political polarization has
acquired in Venezuela, there could be some negative consequences of the
opinions expressed by the children, whether these opinions are supportive or
against any political tendency. For this reason, their names were modified to
guarantee the anonymity and confidentiality of the contents expressed during
the intervention. Since the children are under-age, as already said, an informed
consent was required from their responsible adults (parents and guardians,
fifth grade teacher, subprincipal and school counselor), so they could decide
whether they wanted the children to participate or not in this investigation.

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Consequently, informative meetings were held, so the adults could base their
decisions on solid and clear information. Also, an authorization format was
generated, so parents could manifest their wish to have their children be part of
the research. Previous to this, a notification letter was sent to the parents,
which explained in detail the nature of this intervention.
In the meetings it was made clear that the significant adults could come to
me at any time and ask with total freedom about what happened during the
sessions. Also, every two weeks a meeting with the fifth grade teacher was
held, to check the group’s behavior in the school context, so we could make an
estimation of the intervention’s influence on children. This was made with the
intention of taking actions in time, in case the children had an unfavorable
reaction. One of the aspects that was taken into account was that there could
be a significative increase of disruptive behavior in the school as well as at
home. This was also discussed with the significant adults.

Main Results of the Research

The process of polarization inside the group started with the introduction
of a discursive element, which led to division, polarization and conflict as the
fundamental base of the game. According to Bar-Tal (1990) a group is a
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collectivity of individuals that possess a defined sense of belonging and shared

beliefs, which regulate their behavior. This boys and girls belonged to a group
defined as the 5th grade group at the school they studied in. Each one
possessed certain characteristics and roles inside the group, and part of the
intervention challenge was to initiate a process that allowed a redefinition of
the group based on the story: they were asked to abandon, for one hour, their
identification with their everyday group and assume a new group identity that
corresponded to their belonging to the red or blue kingdom (according to the
story).

Process of Political Polarization

The process of polarization produced by these children bears resemblance

with certain group processes described by some authors (Bion, 1961; Freud,
1948), as well as the process of social polarization described by Lozada (2002
and 2004). However, it was possible to observe the process of polarization in
this group, as well as the process of depolarization, as a manifestation of reject

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towards the violence generated by the specular vision of the two groups. I will
now proceed to describe the process of polarization:
This phenomenon was characterized by being dynamic. As shown in
Table 2, the phases did not occur in a linear way, but they rather were in
constant change, like all social phenomena. During the intervention, certain
events occurred that belonged to the former stages, and they affected later
stages of the process. It was also observed that the interpretation and acting
during each stage was influenced by the gender of the participants; which
manifested through the way they bonded with their leader, the type of
offensive “weapons” used to attack the adversary, as well as their way of
organizing and working as a team. The different stages of this process of
polarization are described as follows.

Table 2. Process of polarization in this research

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Identification with the Leader and Expressions of Dependence

towards Him

In this intervention, according to Bar-Tal (1990), the necessary conditions

for this collectivity to be a group were fulfilled, given that the activity offered
them one of the fundamental elements they needed to be able to identify
themselves as a group: the fact of having some level of coordinate activity.
This activity also helped them share a group of beliefs and define themselves

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as members of a group so this way all the children formed two subgroups (plus
another “group” formed by only one dissident boy: the yellow one), that
fought according to a guideline issued by the kings.
This identification with the leaders was followed by expressions that
reflected the dependence towards these new figures that had invited them to
fight a war. This phenomenon bears resemblance to the state of dependence
described by Bion (1961) which is developed in small, unstructured groups,
and it states that the group perceives the leader as omnipotent and omniscient.
The dependence manifested by the group corresponded to very early stages of
development in which the leader is expected to supply the most basic needs of
the citizens, like for example, nourishing. This can be seen in the constant
demand the participants made to give them things to take home: “Boy: And
can we take these handkerchiefs home?” (the hankerchief’s color identified the
kingdom they belonged to).
There were also comments that alluded to the need of following the
leaders so they would give them food and housing. As it was explained before,
in the relationship with the leader emerged contents that seemed to reedit the
group’s individuals narcissistic aspirations of fusion (Kernberg, 1999).
Another aspect that could also be introduced as an explanation for this
attitudes has to do with Venezuela’s social reality. This boys and girls belong
to a social class where the theme of economic resources happens to be an
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important content for their families. Generally, this resources are invested on
food and housing. For the people who belong to a mid-low social class,
especially in Caracas, getting a house is becoming a difficult task to achieve
due to the high expenses and the scarcity of it in the city. This situation leads
to people turning to the government and asking for its help, so they can satisfy
this need and solve their problem.

The Other Perceived as a Threat. Negative Attributions towards

the Other

In this stage people start to understand the relationship with the others in a
split or polarized way, which is part of the weakening of the ego functions that
happens in the groups (Kernber, 1999) during situations of conflict and
polarization (Lechner 1986; quoted by Lira, 1991). In this stage, polarization
becomes more evident, increasing the number of violent actions towards the
other, who is perceived as a threatening figure (Lozada, 2004). There seems to
be a fusion of the two stages proposed by Lozada (2004), which consists in

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perceiving the other as an enemy and legitimize the use of violence as a

resource for defense.
It is observed, during the process of polarization of the participants, that
the legitimization of violence occurs along the dehumanization of the
adversary (Kelman & Hamilton, 1989), as well of themselves (Martín Baró,
1990; Samayoa; quoted by Martín Baró, 1990). The dehumanization of the
other is defined as the objectification of the adversary, the other becomes a
political objective and their condition as a human being is ignored. In the
game, the ones from the other kingdom cease to be their schoolmates to be
“the blue ones” or “the red ones”. During session 4 took place a discussion
that reveals this process:

J: What do you think of the Red castle?

Mateo: That I like the castle of the red ones because there are a lot of
pretty girls there.
Boys and girls from the blue kingdom: (noise and whistling, applauses).
4
¡Traitor, you’re a traitor, vendepatria !

This fragment illustrates how the contrary group loses all possibility of
deserving any positive consideration from the other group. The fact of
recognizing that some girls from the red group are pretty unleashes an intense
furor in the blue group, which does not tolerate anyone from their group
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humanizing their contender. Polarization requires that the other one is blurred,
so they can be object of the negative projections and attacks coming from the
adversary. That is why when Mateo gives the red girls the quality of person, it
generates an unbalance in the group which translates to anguish, anger and
tension.
As a reaction to the group’s angry response, Alberto comes up with a
reflection:

Alberto: I just don’t understand why does Juan have to be upset. If I tell
Mateo to say that the girls from the red team are really pretty and it’s the
same, we are all people. Do they have to be enemies only because some
are blue and some are red? I mean, I can be friends with a red one, and
that doesn’t mean I’m a traitor.

Alberto identifies in a very explicit way the dehumanization Juan makes

of the girls, as a member of the blue team. He tries to remark the need to have

4
Offensive term that implies that the person is capable of “selling his country”, betraying it.

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diversity in the group. In his phrase “we’re all people”, he tries to save the
group from its own dehumanization and from the dehumanization of the other.
When dehumanizing the other, one denies the own human condition. That is
why it is considered that the process of dehumanization of the other and the
self are related. When the process of personal dehumanization occurs, there is
a decrease in the capacity of being empathic towards the suffering of others,
and people are less able to think and communicate in assertive ways (Martín-
Baró, 1990). The possibility of both concepts showing two faces of the same
phenomenon that occurs during polarization must be considered.
An aspect that could have also influenced the legitimization of violence
was the normalization that leaders made of violence as a way of solving
conflicts between the groups. Barreto and Borja (2007) argue that the
delegitimization of the adversary is a strategy used with the finality
of legitimizing violence. They state this in a study that pretended to understand
political violence under the light of some psychosocial considerations such
as the psychology of legitimacy, the intergroup conflict and the impact of
the speech in legitimization and delegitimization. The delegitimization
of the adversary is understood as a process of recategorization of a political
action, system, group or person that was previously legitimate or illegitimate.
In the group of participants, as well as it usually occurs in society, the
moral and social values acted as regulators of the use of violence (Barreto and
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Borja, 2007). However, the function of norms and values was shadowed
by the introduction of a speech that marked the other as an enemy to be fought.
This combat speech introduced by the co-facilitator and me had its limits,
which stated that violence should be kept symbolic, in the writings or the
drawings, but never in action. The creation of rules that regulated the
children’s behavior (session 1) had the intention of keeping physical
and verbal violence under control. War had to take place only in the children’s
imagination and games.
Despite these previous considerations, it was possible to observe that
when there is a speech approved by the authority that legitimates violence
(Kelman and Hamilton, 2007), such as inviting the children to play war, it
does not matter what other limits are established. Participants connect with the
war situation, limits get blurred and the members of the group end up acting
out the conflict with their partners. The function of limits was to regulate the
use of violence in the classroom, to signal those actions that hurt physically or
verbally. However, children with more predispositions to impulsive behavior
and disrespecting the rules turned out to be more vulnerable to act out the
violence in the group. They served as catalysts of conflict in the classroom.

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It is possible that this type of war situations puts the children in a

predominantly schyzo-paranoid position (Klein, 1964) where projections,
persecutory fears, envy and omnipotence rule, and as a consequence, it
translated in clearly aggressive behavior towards their partners.
Their aggression was manifested through the use of certain “weapons”
that allowed them to attack their contender. These weapons were basically
jeers, verbal insults and disqualification. Boys used more frequently jeering
and verbal insults to attack their enemies; besides, they were much more
offensive and crude when compared to the use girls made of the same
weapons. In every insult an emphasis was made in how much they disliked
differences, thus suggesting rejection towards the possible tendency of
different sexual choices, racial differences, different customs, and physical
aspect, among others.
The insults used by the girls tended to be more subtle, although that did
not make them any less hurtful or provocative. A clear example of this is
observed in the comment Luisa makes to a boy from the blue team when asked
about what they ate in the red kingdom (her kingdom):

Luisa: Teacher, I say that they [the red ones] eat healthy and balanced
food, because we, the red ones, don’t fight for food.
J: They eat a healthy and balanced food?
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Luisa: Yes, because us girls don’t fight for food, and we don’t eat rats and
all those things they say about us. That’s a lie.
Gabriela: They are famished!.

Likewise, girls used to attack boys by making whispered comments about

them while they pointed at them and then laughed, as a way of provocation.
On the other hand, disqualification consisted in devaluating the other but
without the intention of provoking them; it seemed to be product of the
habitual scission that occurs in the processes of political polarization, in which
the enemy is conferred with negative and devaluated attributes, as a way of
controlling him and reducing the fear he generates. The main disqualification
was the madness of the other team. Historically, madness has been a
stigmatizing condition that marks the individuals and casts them out of the
society. Consequently, Manuel said: “¡Nooooo! Since they’re mad, their brain
has melted down!” and Juan: “Because they’re just like (…) I don’t know,
crazy”.
They also employed betrayal as a way of attacking dissidents inside the
group. As stated by Bion (1961), in small, unstructured groups, members have
little tolerance towards dissidence, and they react to it by forming subgroups.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 22 Alejandra Sapene

The children started yelling like this to a boy who took off his blue
handkerchief: “He’s a red one! ¡Traitor!”; and to other one who expressed his
appreciation for the girls from the red team: “Traitor!, Country seller!”. This
phrase turns out to be very eloquent, since it expresses the feeling that
whoever thinks differently than the rest of the group or does not show an
absolute rejection for the adversary is considered to be capable of “selling his
country”, of attacking his own leader and his people, leaving them with no
territory.
Other disqualifications consisted in rejecting others’ behavior claiming
that they were “wasted” or had “lack of taste” when it came to decorating their
castle or dressing. On the other hand, they would use gender stereotypes to
mutually attack each other. Boys claimed that girls were weak only because
they belonged to the feminine gender:

Carlos: Besides, girls could never beat boys.

Rosa: Girls could never beat boys? What do you mean? Explain it to me.
Carlos: Because we are stronger.

And girls disqualified boys for being messy:

Gabriela: I think that the Blue castle is, I don’t know, I don’t know what
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

it seems like, to me. The Red castle is prettier than theirs because they are
boys and they don’t take care of their stuff, at least girls clean up their
rooms.

It was interesting to observe how they used stereotyping as an insult, and

at the same time they used values that were important for each gender as a way
of disqualifying the other. Another way of disqualifying was through those
things that the contrary group lacked of, or were damaged. For example, in
session 4, Manuel suggested that “In this castle (the Red kingdom castle) they
have nothing. Not even a house”. And then Juan, in the same session, pointed
out that “apparently all the planes from the Red kingdom are rusty”.
Poverty also was an attribute used to disqualify the other, particularly to
disqualify the Yellow kingdom (Ss. 2 L. 276, 278) “this is the kingdom of the
poor (…) For there is only one person”.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 "We Want No More War" 23

Influence of Violence on Psychologists

This situation of polarization not only affected children, but also the
psychologists that facilitated the activity. When the amount of violence among
the participants started increasing in frequency and intensity, the assistant co-
facilitator and I started to feel we were losing control of the group. That is
reflected on some interventions in session 4. Examples of this session are
shown in table 3:

Table 3. Interventions aimed to group control Session 4

“Calm down, calm down, we cannot hear each other if we talk like this” (L. 172);
“Hold on, put your hand down, Juan, I’m over here. Gabrielle”(L.179),
“You guys have to wait until the other is done talking” (L.190 );
“Hold on a minute”;
“Hold on, you’re not letting him finish. Silence” (L. 309-310);
No te estamos preguntando a ti (L. 374);
No nos podemos tratar así (L. 481).

Besides the interventions that were transcripted, there were multiple

signals made by us that were not registered in the recording. Session 4 was
characterized by a significant lack of control over the group. Maybe this was
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

the reason why there were a lot of interventions made to maintain order, to
limit participation and, sometimes those interventions may have been made in
a tone of anger and desperation. Somehow we tried to transmit the children the
need to listen and recognize the others. Boys and girls acted out a war in which
they fought symbolically, they got polarized and, once the process was
initiated, it was very hard to regulate their attack conducts. As the participants
got more radical, our interventions also were more radical and less open to
hearing the children. When we realized that we were doing this, after checking
out session 4, we used strategies that invited them to reflection, and also
avoided the exacerbation of conflict levels in the group in the following
sessions.
As violence got cruder, the children’s beliefs got more rigid, and that
made them hard to problematize. We started feeling that war had taken over
them, and that there was only room for those statements that confirmed what
they thought. If anyone proposed a different idea, this was strongly attacked or
simply denied, which allowed hopelessness to invade us in a progressive way.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 24 Alejandra Sapene

Disqualification of the Unaligned

Aligned makes reference to the person who has taken part of a conflict or
dissidence. Thus, the unaligned in this investigation are those people who
reject to take part of a war conflict and decide not to polarize. This case only
happened with the child who chose to be “the yellow one”, assuming a neutral
and unaligned role in the war that was proposed. Then there were other
children that, when they felt that their group did not tolerate diversity, felt the
need to align with the yellow one or form a kingdom on their own.

Ideal of Absolute Uniformity in the Group

From the first moment, the two polarized subgroups demanded absolute
loyalty towards their respective kingdoms, thus impliying the homogenization
of each one’s personal characteristics. In session 3 this phenomenon can be
easily observed, in the following examples:

A: So, people who belong to the same kingdom, they never fight?
Children: No!!!
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Just as stated by Montero (2002), in polarization the idea is to dilute the

self into a sector or pole of collective thought. To be part of one of the poles,
one must renounce to one’s own individual identity, identifying massively
with the group’s ideas. In the example shown above, it is possible to
appreciate the idea of thought uniformity the children aspire to reach.
Everyone gets along just fine because there is no one who dissents. Thus, the
conflict explained by Kernberg (1999) emerges, emphasizing the group’s
needs to annul intragroup conflicts by introducing an external enemy.
However, Bion (1961) states that in small groups’ stage of fight-flight, there is
a moment in which the members do not tolerate intragroup differences and
they start to form subgroups. This phenomenon also happened in the blue
group. There were boys, like Mateo and Alberto, who created a different group
when they started feeling uncomfortable with the original group’s ideas. Also,
parallel leaderships emerged in the group. For example, Juan always catalyzed
the conflict and tension situation in the blue group, and María did likewise in
the red group. Both of them expressed the rudest insults and stirred their group
against the other.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 "We Want No More War" 25

Disqualification of the Yellow One

Jacinto, the Yellow king, turned out to be an “incomprehensible”

phenomenon to the other participants that were polarized. This boy decided
not to give in to group pressure to belong to any predefined group (red or
blue), choosing not to be part of the polarization.

A: Jacinto belongs to the Yellow kingdom.

Juan: But that one is not in the story.
A: It does not appear in the story, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
In this classroom it does exist.

This choice left the polarized children out of place, since their schemes did
not include the possibility of rejecting the option of polarizing. Faced to this
difference, their first reaction was to disqualify him by calling his creation “the
kingdom of the poor (…) for there is only person”. The person who chose to
be different was stigmatized and qualified as weak, lacking of resources. In a
country like Venezuela, where the greatest part of the population lives in
poverty, it is important to remark the stigmatized idea regarding poverty. The
poor is seen by these children as a person who thinks differently, who does not
align and does not adapt to the other, as well as being the one with less power.
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

The children based their belief regarding to the power in the amount of people
and resources they could count on, therefore denying the other the possibility
of exerting influence despite being only one person.
From this emerged other disqualifications alluding the weakness of the
yellow one, by calling him “yellow chicken (…) the little chicken”. This
comment emphasized the vulnerability and fragility of the chicken, and it
shows the way in which they take from the lone other all the capacity to
exercise power and strength by their infantilizing him. Also in session 4,
Mateo tells him that he “eats roaches”. Like this, the process of projection in
the other their own fears and ghosts is revealed. This helped them preserve
only the bright, idealized side for themselves (Montero, 2002).

Consolidation of the Group’s Sense of Belonging

The process of disqualification and denigration of the other leaded to

consolidation of the sense of belonging to the group. Barreto and Borja (2007)
affirm that in groups where violence is legitimized, beliefs are needed in order

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 26 Alejandra Sapene

to build rationalizations justifying their actions. The speech used by the group
to refer to themselves usually favored the presentation of their own members
and group (Van Dijk, 2003). In this case, external presentation was full of
positive attributes allowing them to preserve each gorup image:

I think that the Blue castle is, I don’t know what it seems like, to me. The
Red castle it’s prettier than theirs because they are boys and they don’t
take care of their stuff, at least girls clean up their rooms.

Thus, in this research it was observed that in-group victimization was one
of the characteristics most clearly manifested by boys and girls. Each one felt
attacked and damaged by the other, so members of each group felt they had
the “right” to use insults, jeers and disqualification as a form of defense and
attack against the other.

Recognition of Leaders as Heads of the Group

A fundamental element that allows polarization to penetrate in a group is

that the leader has convening power and his speech captivates the collective
(Barreto and Borja, 2007). The group cohesion was based on the leaders’
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

proposals, who offered them structure and guidance to go on (Morales, Moya,

Rebolloso, Fernández, Huici, Marquez, Páez and Pérez, 1997). In the Red
kingdom, it was easily observed the identification its members had with their
leader:

Enrique: Queen Alejandra, yes, yes, write it down.

A: But you can name her differently. It doesn’t necessarily have to be my
name (Alejandra is the facilitator’s name).
Children: We want her to be named Alejandra.

Even though in the blue kingdom they had more dissidences regarding to
the disposition to recognize the king’s leadership, there were some expressions
determinining the recognition of the king as a leader: “this is the king of the
troops, the one who commands the troops”. However, in the same line of
thought, the boy points out that the king is named “Rocks”, which shows the
children’s resistance to follow the co-facilitator as their leader.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 "We Want No More War" 27

Desire to Align those who are Not Aligned

As the last stage of the process of polarization arose the desire to align the
unaligned as a way of attracting members to their troops and thus improve
their battle force: “Come to the blue side! Come!”. This started showing a
more flexible cognitive position and therefore less polarized. Through this
opening it is possible to show recognition of the other as someone important
for achieving the goals that have been set.
This can be considered as a war weapon that allows to divide the
adversary, but it also shows the group’s permeability to the differences, and
this may offer an opportunity to start the process of depolarization. As a mater
of fact, this process started occurring during half of session number 4, and
from that moment on, depolarization started as a response to the pressure and
anguish that violence had generated in the participants.

Table 4. Group dismembering process

Exclusion of the
most passive
group members
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Discontent
Exclusion of group towards own Desire to join a
members according to group different group
their gender

Mistrust towards
people who does
not share group
symbols

PROCESS OF DEPOLARIZATION
The process of depolarization is considered as a continuum inside the
global process of polarization. For the effects of this investigation, I show both
separately to highlight the importance of group dismembering that arises as a
rejection of violence from boys and girls as well.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 28 Alejandra Sapene

Exclusion as a Way of Rejecting Diversity

Exclusion is built as a fundamental manifestation of group dismembering.

Group dismembering is understood as the process by which the members of
the group start generating mechanisms in order to regulate diversity inside the
group. Given that absolute uniformity is untenable, the group creates strategies
allowing it to maintain intragroup cognitive and systemic balance. In the
process of political polarization, the fundamental objective consists in
projecting in the enemy every negative aspect with the intention of preserving
a clean, positive image of one’s own group.
Thus, when differences start emerging in the group, it uses exclusion as a
way of guaranteeing group homogeneity. In other words, the possibility of
belonging to their own group is denied to some group members who manifest
some characteristics that diverge from the collective. This exclusion happened
in the group of boys (the blue one), especially with those members that were
considered weak and passive:

A: What happens with these blue ones that are not with their people?
Mateo: They won’t let us.
A: And what do you think of them not letting you in? Share your opinion
with the interviewer here.
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Rosa: What do you think?

Mateo: Nothing.
Rosa: Why don’t you join your group, then?
Mateo: I was going to join them, but they pushed me away and grabbed
me.

Mateo was a boy that was permanently excluded from group dynamics
because he had little self reassuring capacity, and had a great need of approval
from the authority, which lead him to denounce some of his partner’s
transgressions to win the teacher’s affection. Maybe this is why the group of
boys permanently rejected him and took him out of their kingdom’s “ranks”.
However, it is also true that Mateo had a hard time finding the right skills to
make a successful adaptation to the group. His characteristics made the group
deny him the possibility to be part of it.
On the other hand, the girls considered at some point that gender could
make the difference inside their group. Thus, on session 4, they eliminated
from their speech, unwillingly, the boys that belonged to the group, for
considering them messy and destructive:

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 "We Want No More War" 29

J: Wait a minute. Hold on, listen. Gabriela said that because you were
girls, you took better care of things, but in the Red Kingdom there are
also boys.
Luisa: Well, but most of us are girls.

Once the process of exclusion and mistrust from the members of the
red and blue groups occurred, it unraveled a sequence of discontents and
manifestations of violence rejection that ended up in the need of conciliation
and the search of peace. Boys and girls started asking to “build up new
kingdoms”, as well as “ to leave that group”. Discontent with one’s own group
seems to induce reflection about the need of having spaces to express diversity
of thought and action. Just as Barreto and Borja (2007) state about the capacity
to resist the speech that promotes the legitimization of violence that some
members of society have, despite the highly ideologizing power these
speeches could have, people keep having the capacity of discerning, so they
can choose to keep with the polarization or move out of it.
It is possible that in this investigation, these results may have occurred
faster than in real life. Martín-Baró (1990) stated that in situations where
political polarization happens in environments defined by clear signs of threat
to the physical integrity, fear usually paralyzes or reverts the population’s
attempts to depolarize. However, it is positive that in these children’s group
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

dynamic, this process of dismembering due to the uneasiness generated by the

polarized violence. It was a sign of rejecting polarization.

CONCLUSIONS
One of the main accomplishments was to actually having been able to do
this research and action despite the expressed fear of the significant adults that
surrounded the children participants and, their doubts about the viability of the
study. We can conclude that when one acts in a responsible, committed, and
reflexive manner it is possible to overcome fear and turn it into an opportunity
to achieve transformation and change. The adults’ fear helped me to give the
sessions a new meaning, and find more careful ways to achieve the research
objectives. Participatory action research was a basic instrument of work. The
systematic problematization of naturalized elements of reality contributed to
the work’s flow, helping to adjust it to the characteristics of the institution, of
the participants, and of the meaningful adults.

Psychology of War, Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated, 2012. ProQuest Ebook Central,
 30 Alejandra Sapene

I believe that referring to the topic of political polarization from a

secondary prevention viewpoint is the most effective way of dealing with this
issue. In Venezuela there have been some interventions related to this subject,
but from a perspective of attention in crisis or tertiary attention. I consider
peace should be constructed in spaces of daily coexistence. Such spaces offer
the opportunity to think and observe the daily benefits produced by
maintaining positive relationships with others, and they also offer resources to
face possible future crises or the “hardening” of political dynamics.
I also observed important indicators related to the children’s awareness.
The participants succeeded in detaching themselves from the emotional side
that the conflict awakened and they managed to offer solutions based on
respect and consideration toward the “other.” Furthermore, they reacted
against authoritarianism by rejecting absolute uniformity. They were also
capable of proposing alternatives that would promote tolerance of individual
differences in the classroom.
The children did reiterate attempts to integrate as a group and break the
polarization.In spite of the apparent conventionality of the solutions they
proposed to avoid war, expected for their age, in many interventions they were
able to transcend the schemes and criticize the authority’s orders.
A series of reflective and analytic resources were mobilized, allowing
them to go deeper in the contents and create conclusions that affected
Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

positively their psychological wellbeing. Despite having interpersonal

problems (as informed by some teachers), these children where able to follow
norms and instructions, and also had the flexibility to respect some new
authority figures (myself and my assistant). Some of them voiced personal
reflections in a play situation in the classroom. One of the children wrote: “I
should be cooler instead of getting angry at everything people tell me.”
This child was able to rethink about his own personal characteristics and
how they influence the promotion of peace in the classroom. Moreover,
another child transferred the acquired knowledge to another daily situation,
when during an activity he reminded one of his classmates about the
importance of dialog and listening, which he learned during the playing
research activity.
The strategy used helped the participants to experiment in an affective
way the situation of war and polarization. This seems to have influenced the
expressed rejection against violence, which was a product of the discomfort
that they felt. The problematized and catalytic interventions favored
awareness.

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 "We Want No More War" 31

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 In: Psychology of War ISBN: 978-1- 61942-312-1
Editors: E. Alvarez and A. Escobar ©2012 Nova Science Publishers, Inc.

Chapter 2

CHILDREN’S PSYCHOLOGICAL DISTRESS

AND NEEDS IN NORTHERN UGANDA’S
CONFLICT ZONE: AN ASSESSMENT
OF STAKEHOLDERS’ CONFLICTING
ENGAGEMENTS

Grace Akello1, Annemiek Richters2, Ria Reis3

Copyright © 2012. Nova Science Publishers, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

and Charles B. Rwabukwali4

1
Gulu University, Faculty of Medicine. Gulu, Uganda.
2
Department of Public Health and Primary Care,
Section Medical Anthropology, Leiden University Medical Center
Leiden, The Netherlands
3
Universiteit van Amsterdam, Medical Anthropology Unit,
Achterburgwal 185, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
4
Makerere University, Faculty of Social Sciences. Kampala, Uganda

ABSTRACT
During the prolonged armed conflict in Northern Uganda, the state
through its Uganda People’s Defence Force (UPDF) and non-
governmental organisations (NGOs) were based in the conflict zone to
protect and promote psychosocial well-being of the civilians.
Nevertheless people in this region continued to be exposed to
dangers of wartime and psychosocial suffering. This chapter seeks to

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LETTER XXVII.

Dear Sir,—I have to inform you that “the pretty little poem” to
which you allude in your letter is not, as you suppose, of my
composition. The author is unknown to me. The poem is very
pretty.

Yours, &c.

JOSEPH C. MILLER.

The writing of Miss Gould resembles that of Miss Leslie very nearly.
It is rather more petite—but has the same neatness,
picturesqueness and finish without over-effeminacy. The literary
style of one who writes thus is sure to be forcibly epigrammatic—
either in detached sentences—or in the tout ensemble of the
composition. Paper very fine—wafered.

LETTER XXVIII.

Dear Sir,—Herewith I have the honor of sending you what you

desire. If the Essay shall be found to give you any new
information, I shall not regret the trouble of having written it.

Respectfully,
 JOSEPH D. MILLER, Esq.

The MS. of Professor Dew is large, bold, very heavy, abrupt, and
illegible. It is possible that he never thinks of mending a pen. There
can be no doubt that his chirography has been modified, like that of
Paulding, by strong adventitious circumstances—for it appears to
retain but few of his literary peculiarities. Among the few retained,
are boldness and weight. The abruptness we do not find in his
composition—which is indeed somewhat diffuse. Neither is the
illegibility of the MS. to be paralleled by any confusion of thought or
expression. He is remarkably lucid. We must look for the two last
mentioned qualities of his MS. in the supposition that he has been in
the habit of writing a great deal, in a desperate hurry, and with a
stump of a pen. Paper good—but only a half sheet of it—wafered.

LETTER XXIX.

Dear Sir,—In reply to your query touching the “authenticity of a

singular incident,” related in one of my poems, I have to inform
you that the incident in question is purely a fiction.

With respect, your obedient servant,

JOSEPH E. F. MILLER, Esq.

The hand-writing of Mr. Mellen is somewhat peculiar, and partakes

largely of the character of the signature annexed. It would require
no great stretch of fancy to imagine the writer (from what we see of
his MS.) a man of excessive sensibility, amounting nearly to disease
—of unbounded ambition, greatly interfered with by frequent moods
of doubt and depression, and by unsettled ideas of the beautiful.
The formation of the G in his signature alone, might warrant us in
supposing his composition to have great force, frequently impaired
by an undue straining after effect. Paper excellent—red seal.

LETTER XXX.

Dear Sir,—I have not the pleasure of your acquaintance, but

thank you for the great interest you seem to take in my welfare.
I have no relations by the name of Miller, and think you must be
in error about the family connection.

Respectfully,

JOSEPH G. H. MILLER, Esq.

The MS. of Mr. Simms resembles, very nearly, that of Mr. Kennedy. It
has more slope, however, and less of the picturesque—although still
much. We spoke of Mr. K.'s MS. (in our February number) as
indicating “the eye of a painter.” In our critique on the Partisan we
spoke of Mr. Simms also as possessing “the eye of a painter,” and we
had not then seen his hand-writing. The two MSS. are strikingly
similar. The paper here is very fine and wafered.

LETTER XXXI.

Dear Sir,—I have received your favor of the —— inst. and shall
be very happy in doing you the little service you mention. In a
few days I will write you more fully. Very respectfully,
 Your most obedient servant,

JOSEPH I. K. MILLER, Esq.

Lieutenant Slidell's MS. is peculiar—very neat, very even, and

tolerably legible, but somewhat too diminutive. Black lines have
been, apparently, used. Few tokens of literary manner or character
are to be found in this writing. The petiteness, however, is most
strikingly indicative of a mental habit, which we have more than
once pointedly noticed in the works of this author—we mean that of
close observation in detail—a habit which, when well regulated, as in
the case of Lieut. Slidell, tends greatly to vigor of style. Paper
excellent—wafered.

LETTER XXXII.

Dear Sir,—I find upon reference to some MS. notes now lying by
me, that the article to which you have allusion, appeared
originally in the “Journal des Sçavans.”

Very respectfully,

JOSEPH L. M. MILLER, Esq.

The writing of Professor Anthon is remarkably neat and beautiful—in

the formation of particular letters as well as in the tout-ensemble.
The perfect regularity of the MS. gives it, to a casual glance, the
appearance of print. The lines are quite straight and at even
distances—yet they are evidently written without any artificial aid.
We may at once recognise in this chirography the scrupulous
precision and finish—the love of elegance—together with the scorn
of all superfluous embellishment, which so greatly distinguish the
compilations of the writer. The paper is yellow, very fine, and sealed
with green wax, bearing the impression of a head of Cæsar.

LETTER XXXIII.

Dear Sir,—I have looked with great care over several different
editions of Plato, among which I may mention the Bipont
edition, 1781–8, 12 vols, oct.; that of Ast, and that of Bekker,
reprinted in London, 11 vols. oct. I cannot, however, discover
the passage about which you ask me—“is it not very ridiculous?”
You must have mistaken the author. Please write again.

Respectfully yours,

JOSEPH N. O. MILLER, Esq.

The MS. of Professor Lieber has nearly all the characteristics which
we noticed in that of Professor Dew—besides the peculiarity of a
wide margin left at the top of the paper. The whole air of the writing
seems to indicate vivacity and energy of thought—but altogether, the
letter puts us at fault—for we have never before known a man of
minute erudition (and such is Professor Lieber,) who did not write a
very different hand from this. We should have imagined a petite and
careful chirography. Paper tolerable and wafered.
 LETTER XXXIV.

Dear Sir,—I beg leave to assure you that I have never received,
for my Magazine, any copy of verses with so ludicrous a title as
“The nine and twenty Magpies.” Moreover, if I had, I should
certainly have thrown it into the fire. I wish you would not worry
me any farther about this matter. The verses, I dare say, are
somewhere among your papers. You had better look them up—
they may do for the Mirror.

JOSEPH P. Q. MILLER.

Mrs. Hale writes a larger and bolder hand than her sex generally. It
resembles, in a great degree, that of Professor Lieber—and is not
easily decyphered. The whole MS. is indicative of a masculine
understanding. Paper very good, and wafered.

LETTER XXXV.

Dear Sir,—I am not to be quizzed. You suppose, eh? that I can't

understand your fine letter all about “things in general.” You
want my autograph, you dog—and you sha'nt have it.

Yours respectfully,

JOSEPH R. S. MILLER, Esq.

Mr. Noah writes a very good running hand. The lines, however, are
not straight, and the letters have too much tapering to please the
eye of an artist. The long letters and capitals extend very little
beyond the others—either up or down. The epistle has the
appearance of being written very fast. Some of the characters have
now and then a little twirl, like the tail of a pig—which gives the MS.
an air of the quizzical, and devil-me-care. Paper pretty good—and
wafered.

LETTER XXXVI.

Mister—I say—It's not worth while trying to come possum over

the Major. Your letter's no go. I'm up to a thing or two—or else
my name isn't

JOSEPH T. V. MILLER.

The Major writes a very excellent hand indeed. It has so striking a

resemblance to that of Mr. Brooks, that we shall say nothing farther
about it.

LETTER XXXVII.

Dear Sir,—I am exceedingly and excessively sorry that it is out

of my power to comply with your rational and reasonable
request. The subject you mention is one with which I am utterly
unacquainted—moreover it is one about which I know very little.

Respectfully,

JOSEPH W. X. MILLER, Esq.

Mr. Stone's MS. has some very good points about it—among which is
a certain degree of the picturesque. In general it is heavy and
sprawling—the short letters running too much together. From the
chirography no precise opinion can be had of Mr. Stone's literary
style. [Mr. Messenger says no opinion can be had of it in any way.]
Paper very good and wafered.

LETTER XXXVIII.

My Good Fellow,—I am not disposed to find fault with your

having addressed me, although personally unknown. Your favor
(of the —— ultimo) finds me upon the eve of directing my
course towards the renowned shores of Italia. I shall land
(primitively) on the territories of the ancient Brutii, of whom you
may find an account in Lempriére. You will observe (therefore)
that, being engrossed by the consequent, necessary, and
important preparations for my departure, I can have no time to
attend to your little concerns.

Believe me, my dear sir, very faithfully your

JOSEPH Y. Z. MILLER, Esq.

Mr. Fay writes a passable hand. There is a good deal of spirit—and

some force. His paper has a clean appearance, and he is
scrupulously attentive to his margin. The MS. however, has an air of
swagger about it. There are too many dashes—and the tails of the
long letters are too long. [Mr. Messenger thinks I am right—that Mr.
F. shouldn't try to cut a dash—and that all his tales are too long. The
swagger he says is respectable, and indicates a superfluity of
thought.]
 *** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SOUTHERN
LITERARY MESSENGER, VOL. II., NO. 9, AUGUST, 1836 ***

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