Травма социального исключения и трансформация идентичности героя романа Кобо Абэ «Чужое лицо»

Abstract

This article analyzes Kobo Abe’s novel The Face of Another in terms of its depiction of the protagonist’s
trauma and identity crisis resulting from social ostracism. The author focuses on the experience of social
exclusion in a person shaped by a collectivist society. Drawing on studies of group consciousness in Japanese
society, the article argues that it was not the physical injury itself but the subsequent social exclusion following the accident that produced the protagonist’s psychological trauma and transformation of identity.
Particular attention is given to the traumatic experience of alienation and its destructive impact on human
identity. The social context makes it possible to explore the experience of otherness encountered by a
Japanese individual whose sense of belonging to a group constitutes a significant part of their identity. The protagonist’s identity crisis is examined against the backdrop of the formation of national identity in postwar
Japanese society, which, under the influence of Western culture, allows for a reconsideration of the stereotype
of a dichotomy between Japanese collectivism and Western individualism. This perspective shapes the decolonial approach of the study. In addition, the protagonist’s identity is analyzed through the lens of contemporary theories of embodied consciousness. This analytical perspective guided the research methodology, which draws on the concept of identity, as well as theories of trauma, otherness, and embodied consciousness. Such an approach ensures both the novelty and relevance of the study. The aim of the research
is to analyze trauma and identity crisis as consequences of social exclusion. This aim is pursued by clarifying
the essence of group consciousness and the nature of otherness, which together make it possible to identify
the character of the protagonist’s psychological trauma and the reasons for his transformation of identity. The
article argues that what proves traumatic for the protagonist is not the singular event of the accident, but its
aftermath—his exclusion from habitual social relations. The results of the study demonstrate that social
exclusion sensitizes the protagonist to the nature of otherness. The expulsion of an individual from a traditional collectivist group leads not only to a crisis of personal identity, but also to the formation of a new
identity based on individualism. Furthermore, an individual’s identity and cognitive processes are understood
as the embodiment of their physical and bodily dependence on the social environment—its conditions and
norms.