Memory Without Recollection: Body and Intergenerational Transmission of Migratory Displacement

The intergenerational transmission of migratory trauma occurs on two levels that are rarely distinguished. The first is narrative: what the family tells, what it says, what it explains or silences with words. The second is bodily: what the family does without saying, the attitudes that accompany the story or replace it when there is no story. The literature on migration and mental health has privileged the first level. This article argues that the second is equally decisive, and that the two are articulated in complex ways that clinical practice must learn to read. The central thesis is that migratory displacement does not end when the journey ends. It continues in the body of the one who migrated and is inscribed, in ways that do not necessarily pass through verbal language, in the body of their descendants. What is inherited is not only a story. What is inherited is a bodily attitude toward the world: a way of tensing, of avoiding, of inhabiting space. To develop this thesis, three concepts are articulated — embodied memory, postmemory, and intergenerational transmission of trauma — and their joint manifestation in the consulting room is analysed through an illustrative clinical case. The article forms part of a broader research line on identity fracture in migratory contexts (Martínez, 2026a, 2026b, 2026c), and focuses here on a dimension that purely narrative approaches tend to leave aside. This article draws on the author's clinical experience with migrant populations and their descendants over two decades.