Title:   VIOLENCE IN THE ERA OF SOCIAL MEDIA: A READING OF OYINKAN BRAITHWAITE’S MY SISTER, THE SERIAL KILLER

Abstract
Violence has a lot of offshoots but the type represented in Oyinkan Braithwaite’s My Sister, the Serial Killer explains how violence is etched on the mind of a child who has witnessed and suffered different forms of violence by her father and who grows up to challenge and kill any man who as much as raises his voice at her. Braithwaite through her writing explains the part played by social media in aiding to the faster spreading of information which though an advantage can also be a demerit. In the text, Ayoola and Korede’s father’s death is finally announced by members of his family after they have exhaled the collective breath they have held for a long time due to the violence meted out to them by their patriarch. In later years, when Ayoola becomes the abuser, her victims did not stand that chance because as soon as Korede finishes cleaning up and disposing of the body of one of her sister’s victims, the missing body becomes a hashtag on Instagram. Photos and videos Ayoola posted on Instagram further help investigators in identifying and connecting her victims. This article sets out to look at how children react to violence as adults and the way social media help to further spread the news about issues that certain units will rather be left hidden. It will achieve this by showing different reactions to violence by analyzing My Sister, the Serial Killer through the lens of Trauma Theory which will further reveal the state of the characters’ psyche while handling violent situations.
Keywords: Violence, Abuse, Social Media, Hashtag, Trauma, Victim, Patriarchy.

Citations:

Publication Date: 2023-04-06