scholarly journals The Holocaust in Lithuania: The Key Characteristics of Its History, and the Key Issues in Historiography and Cultural Memory

2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 261-279
Author(s):  
Stanislovas Stasiulis
Keyword(s):  
Jewish Community ◽  
Cultural Memory ◽  
The West ◽  
German Occupation ◽  
Holocaust Memory ◽  
Key Characteristics ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
History Of ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
Considerable Impact

This article is part of the special cluster titled Conceptualizations of the Holocaust in Germany, Lithuania, Poland, and Ukraine since the 1990s, guest edited by Grzegorz Rossoliński-Liebe. The Holocaust is the darkest page of Lithuanian history: Nearly the whole Jewish community in Lithuania was destroyed, while a part of ethnic Lithuanians participated in this destruction. This article discusses three layers and periods of the Holocaust in Lithuania that have made a considerable impact on the perception of this traumatic period in Lithuanian society. The first period deals with the Lithuanian–Jewish relations during the German occupation in Lithuania (1941–1944). The second one is related to the Soviet reoccupation of Lithuania and discussions among Lithuanian émigrés in the West (1944–1990), which shaped the history of the Holocaust in Lithuania from the ideological (Soviet) and defensive (Lithuanian émigré) perspectives. The final part of this article discusses the historiography and Holocaust memory in independent Lithuania after the 1990s. Almost thirty years of independence mark not only the re-creation of some old myths and stereotypes in Lithuania, but also new groundbreaking and open discussions in society, concerning the perception of this dark page of Lithuanian history.

scholarly journals The Collective Memory of the Holocaust Among Mountain Jews in Modern Israel: Sderot (Case Study)

2020 ◽  
pp. 151-183
Author(s):  
Mateusz Majman
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Jewish Community ◽  
Intergenerational Transmission ◽  
Doctoral Dissertation ◽  
German Occupation ◽  
Holocaust Memory ◽  
Anthropological Study ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
Access To Knowledge

This paper discusses the preliminary findings of a historical, sociological, and anthropological study of the Mountain Jewish community currently living in the Israeli city of Sderot. It is part of a broader study being conducted in Israel for the purpose of my doctoral dissertation. Its aim is to explore what Marianne Hirsch refers to as "the generation of post-memory" among members of the target group by examining their access to knowledge, the memory of trauma, and its intergenerational transmission among the Post-Soviet aliyah generation. The study focuses on the evolution of attitudes among this group, as well as the growth and consolidation of awareness about the Shoah in contemporary Israel. The work examines the transmission of Holocaust memory from generation to generation and the influence of both independent and dependent factors on its course. A distinction is made between people whose ancestors were direct victims and survivors and those whose families managed to escape the sphere of the German occupation.

Theodor Heuss and German-Jewish Reconciliation after 1945

2006 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Jay Howard Geller
Keyword(s):  
Jewish Community ◽  
Karl Marx ◽  
Moral Leadership ◽  
Easy Access ◽  
The West ◽  
Holocaust Memory ◽  
Head Of State ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
German Jewish ◽  
Nazi Era

Since 1949, the Federal of Republic of Germany's titular head of state, the Federal President (Bundespräsident), has set the tone for discussion of the Nazi era and remembrance of the Holocaust. This precedent was established by the first Bundespräsident, Theodor Heuss. Through his speeches, writings, and actions after 1949, Heuss consistently worked for German-Jewish reconciliation, including open dialogue with German Jews and reparations to victims of the Holocaust. He was also the German Jewish community's strongest ally within the West German state administration. However, his work on behalf of the Jewish community was more than a matter of moral leadership. Heuss was both predisposed towards the Jewish community and assisted behind-the-scenes in his efforts. Before 1933, Heuss, an academic, journalist, and liberal politician, had strong ties to the German Jewish bourgeoisie. After 1949, he developed a close working relationship with Karl Marx, publisher of the Jewish community's principal newspaper. Marx assisted Heuss in handling the sensitive topic of Holocaust memory; and through Marx, Jewish notables and groups were able to gain unusually easy access to the West German head of state.

scholarly journals On Becoming a Non-Jewish Holocaust Writer: Yann Martel’s Beatrice and Virgil

Humanities ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 12
Author(s):  
Rachel F. Brenner
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Personal Life ◽  
Holocaust Memory ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The World ◽  
Family Level ◽  
History Of ◽  
Religious Origins

To appraise Martel’s non-Jewish perspective of Holocaust thematic, it is important to assess it in the context of the Jewish relations with the Holocaust. Even though the Jewish claim to the uniqueness of the Holocaust has been disputed since the end of the war especially in Eastern Europe, the Jewish response determined to a large extent the reception of the disaster on the global scene. On a family level, the children of survivors have identified themselves as the legitimate heirs of the unknowable experience of their parents. On a collective level, the decree of Jewish annihilation constructed a Jewish identity that imposed an obligation to keep the Holocaust memory in the consciousness of the world. Martel proposes to supersede the history of the Holocaust with a story which would downplay the Jewish filiation with the Holocaust, elicit an affiliative response to the event of the non-Jewish writer and consequently integrate it into the memory of humanity at large. However, the Holocaust theme of Beatrice and Virgil refuses to assimilate within the general memory of humanity; rather, the consciousness of the event, which pervades the post-Holocaust world, insists on its constant presence. The omnipresence of the Holocaust blurs the distinctions between the filiative (Jewish) and affiliative (non-Jewish) attitudes toward the Jewish tragedy, gripping the writer in its transcendent horror. Disregarding his ethnic or religious origins, the Holocaust takes over the writer’s personal life and determines his story.

scholarly journals The reconfiguration of the European Archive in contemporary German-Jewish migrant-literature

2017 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 38-54
Author(s):  
Jessica Ortner
Keyword(s):  
European Archive ◽  
Eastern European ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Migrant Literature ◽  
Holocaust Memory ◽  
Political Concern ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
Mass Shooting ◽  
History Of ◽  
German Jewish

A considerable number of Eastern European migrant authors of Jewish origin are currently lifting Holocaust memory to a new level. Writing in German about events taking place in remote areas of the world, they expand the German framework of memory from a national to a transnational one. By partaking in reconsidering what is ‘vital for a shared remembering’ of Europe, this branch of writing reflects the European Union’s political concern for integrating the memories of the socialistic regimes in European history writing without relativising the Holocaust. In Vielleicht Esther, Katja Petrowskaja consults various national and private archives in order to recount the history of the mass shooting of over 30,000 Ukrainian Jews at Babij Jar – a canyon near Kiev. Thus, she ‘carries’ a marginalised event of the Holocaust into the German framework of memory and uncovers the layers of amnesia that have not only concealed the event amongst the Soviet public but also distorted and for ever made inaccessible her family’s past.

The Work of Testimony in the Age of Decolonization: Chronicle of a Summer, Cinema Verité, and the Emergence of the Holocaust Survivor

PMLA ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 119 (5) ◽  
pp. 1231-1246
Author(s):  
Michael Rothberg
Keyword(s):  
Turning Point ◽  
Discrete Event ◽  
Holocaust Survivor ◽  
Algerian War ◽  
The Public ◽  
Holocaust Memory ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
First Time

The trial of Adolf Eichmann, in 1961, is generally considered a turning point in the history of Holocaust memory because it brought the Holocaust into the public sphere for the first time as a discrete event on an international scale. In the same year, Jean Rouch and Edgar Morin's film Chronicle of a Summer appeared in France. While absent from scholarship on memory of the Nazi genocide for over forty years, Chronicle of a Summer contains a scene of Holocaust testimony that suggests the need to look beyond the Eichmann trial for alternative articulations of public Holocaust remembrance. This essay considers the juxtaposition in Chronicle of a Summer of Holocaust memory and the history of decolonization in order to rethink the “unique” place that the Holocaust has come to hold in discourses on extreme violence. The essay argues that a discourse of truth and testimony arose in French resistance to the Algerian war that shaped and was shaped by memory of the Nazi genocide.

The Pink Triangle

2021 ◽  
pp. 125-162
Author(s):  
Craig Griffiths
Keyword(s):  
Gay Men ◽  
Concentration Camps ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Gay Liberation ◽  
The West ◽  
German State ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
History Of ◽  
Nazi Persecution

This chapter is about how the memory of persecution decisively shaped 1970s homosexual politics. First, the chapter explores the ‘rediscovery’ of the Nazi persecution of homosexuals, explaining how the model of the Holocaust was sometimes appropriated as part of this process. The chapter then shows how memory of this persecution, combined with the experience of contemporary discrimination, produced a profound alienation on the part of left-wing gay men from the West German state. Following an analysis of how the pink triangle became a transnational symbol, this chapter evaluates discourses of victimhood in gay liberation. Though the pink triangle was reclaimed from its origins as a badge of shame in the concentration camps, it never became an unequivocal symbol of pride. Finally, the chapter explores how, in the late 1970s, activists of all stripes, the commercial gay press, and the first openly gay parliamentary candidates coalesced around making the history of past persecution a central plank in their efforts to insert themselves into the West German mainstream.

Henryk Hoffman Z Drohobycza do Ziemi Obiecanej

2002 ◽  
pp. 486-489
Author(s):  
Dora Kacnelson
Keyword(s):  
Jewish Community ◽  
Hard Work ◽  
Recent History ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
History Of

This chapter discusses the second volume of the series Głosy przeżytych (Voices of the Survivors), which contains the memoirs of Henryk Hoffman. The publication of this memoir has enormous significance for the Jewish community of Drohobych and of the Lviv region. Hoffman’s book is viewed as a living and fascinating source for acquainting oneself with the recent history of the region in the inter-war period, under the so-called first and second Soviet occupations, and during the Holocaust. The author provides abundant testimony to the neighbourly, cooperative relations that existed between Jews and Poles in the spheres of economics, culture, and medicine. One example of such honesty, hard work, modesty, and goodness is the memoirist’s father, Eliasz Hoffman. There are still a dozen or so people living in Drohobych, Jews and Poles, who recall Dr Hoffman — as well as the equally helpful and self-sacrificing Polish doctors Kozłowski and Skulski — with gratitude.

scholarly journals Remembering Sugihara, Re-framing Japan in Europe: Holocaust Era Altruism and the Politics of Cultural Memory

2006 ◽  
Vol 7 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 13-26
Author(s):  
Jane Marie Law
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
Jewish Community ◽  
Cultural Memory ◽  
World War ◽  
Cornell University ◽  
Post World War Ii ◽  
Jewish Diaspora ◽  
The Holocaust

Cornell University This paper is a comparison of two museums dedicated to the Japanese diplomat to Lithuania during World War II, Sugihara Chiune. Credited with having written over 6,000 visas to save the lives of Jews fleeing German occupied Poland into Lithuania, Sugihara is regarded in Europe, in Japan, and within the Jewish community as a whole as an altruistic person. This study is not an inquiry into the merits of Sugihara’s action, but rather astudy of how the process of memorializing, narrativizing and celebrating the life of Sugihara in two vastly different museums is part of a larger project of selective cultural memory on the part of various Japanese organizations and institutions. This paper situates the themes of altruism and heroism in the larger process of cultural memory, to see how such themes operate to advance other projects of collective memory. The case of Sugihara is fascinating precisely because the vastly differing processes of cultural memory of the Holocaust―in Lithuania, in Japan, and in a wider post-World War II, post Holocaust Jewish Diaspora each have different ways of constructing, disseminating and consuming narratives of altruism. This paper is based on fieldwork in Kaunas and Vilnius, Lithuania, in 2003, 2004 and again in 2005 and in Japan in 2005.

scholarly journals Polska literatura najnowsza i Holokaust – edukacyjny potencjał fikcji?

2020 ◽  
pp. 372-388
Author(s):  
Agnieszka Czyżak
Keyword(s):  
Mental Hospital ◽  
Main Part ◽  
Jewish People ◽  
Second World War ◽  
The Novel ◽  
World War ◽  
German Occupation ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
History Of ◽  
Second World

The article contains considerations regarding memory of the Holocaust in Polish contemporary prose and analyses the arguments for and against fictitious representations of theShoah. The author discusses the changes in treating fiction which narrates the history of Jewish people during the Second World War – from works of fiction published after the war (e.g. Wielki Tydzień by Jerzy Andrzejewski) to popular thrillers written in the 21st century. The main part of this article is devoted to a novel Tworki written by Marek Bieńczyk in 1999, telling a story of young people – Poles and Jews – employed in a mental hospital during German occupation. The novel was at the centre stage of discussion about relationship between fiction and the Shoah theme, yet the author of the article argues that it may serve as an important stepping stone in exemplifying history. This literary vision of the Holocaust (defined as “pastoral thriller”) shows educational possibilities of fiction.

Austerlitz im Wartesaal

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 21-34
Author(s):  
Gunther Pakendorf
Keyword(s):  
Natural World ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
Main Character ◽  
The West ◽  
Railway Stations ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
History Of ◽  
In Transit

Abstract The condition of exile and homelessness is one of the recurrent features of W.G. Sebald’s work. This can be seen paradigmatically in the lives narrated in Die Ausgewanderten (The Emigrants). Sebald portrays the history of the West repeatedly as a gradual and relentless decline through various catastrophes towards ultimate destruction. A persuasive metaphor for this perceived human condition of uprootedness and instability is the situation of people in transit in waiting rooms in airports and railway stations. This is best exemplified by the eponymous main character in Sebald’s last novel, Austerlitz, a work in which stations and waiting rooms in Brussels, London, Paris, Prague and other cities are a recurring locus. They are linked symbolically through a network of inter- and intratextual references and associations to Sebald’s major thematic concerns: the Holocaust, the destruction of the natural world and, ultimately, the end of all time.

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