MOTHERHOOD, LOSS, AND DESIRE: A PSYCHOANALYTIC STUDY OF CARIBBEAN FEMALE CHARACTERS

Abstract

This article examines representations of motherhood, maternal loss, and desire in two Caribbean women's novels. Through a postcolonial psychoanalytic framework, focusing on Maryse Condé’s Moi, Tituba sorcière… and Jamaica Kincaid’s Autobiography of My Mother, this study examines how the structural traumas of chattel slavery, colonial displacement, and patriarchal oppression shape the representation of female subjectivity and psychological experience in the selected texts. By synthesizing classical psychoanalytic concepts (Lacanian desire, maternal lack, and mourning/melancholia) with contemporary decolonial trauma theory (2020–2026), we analyze the structural disruption of the maternal bond in the post-plantation landscape. The findings reveal that Caribbean female characters in the selected works navigate a "psycho-maternal matrix" where loss is transformed from an ancestral dead-end into a radical, generative desire only known to them. Through narrative innovation, these authors create a sovereign psychological space that facilitates the healing of fractured maternal lineages and restores ontological autonomy.