«Groupe de guérison des blessures» : une recherche avec des veuves rescapées sur les rituels de deuil et la reconstruction psychique après le génocide au Rwanda

During research work dealing with the contributions and limitations of post-genocide mourning rituals in the psychic reconstruction of survivors, we worked with a group of widow escapees who referred to themselves as: « the wound healing group ». One wound they have tried to deal with is the disappearance of their loved ones and their « burial in the stomach », in the absence of bodies and in waiting to carry out funeral rites. Their testimonies have led us to the hypothesis that funeral rites in post-genocide Rwanda represent an attempt to repair their community space and the bond between the living and the dead, so the dead don't wander among the living and the living don't become living dead. The group appears to have played the traditional mediatory and regulatory role of the stomach (inda) for the widow escapees in their living and regenerative relationship to their culture. The work the group carried out thus contributed to allowing the dead, « buried in the stomach », in waiting to be found and recognized, to be taken charge of and buried in dignity.