Communication and autocommunication in Henri Verneuil’s autobiography <i>Mayrig</i>

Abstract This article examines Henri Verneuil’s autobiography, Mayrig (2005), as a vital cultural artifact that transmits and reshapes Armenian diasporic memory across generations. While existing scholarship recognizes the complexities of autobiographical truth and inherited trauma, less attention has been paid to how specific narrative strategies within diasporic autobiography reframe and expand established theoretical frameworks. Drawing primarily on Juri Lotman’s semiotic communication model “I-I,” this study argues that Mayrig demonstrates an expanded “collective I-I” model of (auto)communication, where the act of autobiography becomes a shared semiotic space for the Armenian diaspora to process inherited memory and forge collective identity. Complemented by insights from Philippe Lejeune’s autobiographical pact, Cathy Caruth’s trauma theory, and Marianne Hirsch’s notion of postmemory, this paper analyzes how Mayrig negotiates the ambiguities of personal and collective memory through Verneuil’s symbolic use of cultural practices, particularly the pakhlava scene. In doing so, it reveals how Mayrig not only transforms individual trauma into a dynamic, collective postmemory but also revises the autobiographical pact to encompass the complex, multifaceted self-representation inherent in transnational, diasporic identity.