The American Photo-Novel in the 21st century: Familial Ties and Historical Kinship in Emma Donoghue’s Akin

This article discusses the particular qualities of the photo-novel, by way of Emma Donoghue’s Akin, and proposes its establishment as a form or genre in its own right, a dominant trend in American literary and cultural production of the twenty-first century, particularly relevant to the country’s contemporaneous preoccupation with nationhood. Following a discussion of the traits and workings of the photo-novel, I contend that, far from the postmodernist employment of images as para-textual elements and insistence on fragmentation, these works constitute hybrid, bimedial sites of convergence, where the private and the familial consistently intermingle with the public and the historical. While blurring the boundaries of spatiotemporal specificities and while clearly highlighting an acknowledgement of the country’s ties with regions lying across its borders, the American photo-novel of the twenty-first century rises consequent to the post-9/11 crisis. It reflects the nation’s endeavour to reassess and recalibrate its identity and position in the world by association, kinship and affiliation.