Embodied Trauma and Narrative Identity: Silence and Resistance in Han Kang’s The Vegetarian

Abstract

Aims: This paper explores Han Kang’s novel The Vegetarian (2007; trans. 2016) to show how the story questions the usual idea that every life can be told as a clear and complete narrative. It focuses on Yeong-hye, a woman whose refusal to eat meat grows into a refusal of speech, relationships, and even her own human body. The aim is to understand how silence and bodily resistance challenge traditional ways of telling stories about trauma and identity.

Methodology and Approaches: The study uses ideas from trauma studies, phenomenology, and narrative identity theory. It looks closely at the novel’s three parts, each told by someone around Yeong-hye—her husband, her brother-in-law, and her sister. Each narrator tries in a different way to make sense of Yeong-hye’s actions but fails to fully explain her. By focusing on moments of silence, refusal, and bodily withdrawal, the paper shows how the novel highlights the limits of storytelling when dealing with painful experiences.

Outcome: The analysis shows that The Vegetarian reveals both the limits and the need for narrative. Yeong-hye’s silence and physical resistance cannot be fully captured by ordinary plots, yet the narrators’ efforts to speak about her show that storytelling remains essential for witnessing and responding to trauma.

Conclusion and Suggestions: The paper concludes that Han Kang’s novel widens the scope of narrative studies by showing that meaning can also come from silence, gaps, and the resistant body. It suggests that future research on trauma and narrative should pay more attention to non-verbal forms of expression and to experiences that resist easy explanation.