Among sources on the Holocaust, survivor testimonies are the least
replaceable and most complex, reflecting both the personality of the
narrator and the conditions and perceptions prevailing at the time of
narration. Scholars, despite their aim to challenge memory and fill
its gaps, often use testimonies uncritically or selectively-mining
them to support generalizations. This book represents a departure,
bringing Holocaust experts Atina Grossmann, Konrad Kwiet, Wendy Lower,
Jürgen Matthäus, and Nechama Tec together to analyze the testimony
of one Holocaust survivor. Born in Bratislava at the end of World War
I, Helen "Zippi" Spitzer Tichauer was sent to Auschwitz in 1942. One
of the few early arrivals to survive the camp and the death marches,
she met her future husband in a DP camp, and they moved to New York in
the 1960s. Beginning in 1946, Zippi devoted many hours to talking with
a small group of scholars about her life. Her wide-ranging interviews
are uniquely suited to raise questions on the meaning and use of
survivor testimony. What do we know today about the workings of a
death camp? How willing are we to learn from the experiences of a
survivor, and how much is our perception preconditioned by
standardized images? What are the mechanisms, aims, and pitfalls of
storytelling? Can survivor testimonies be understood properly without
guidance from those who experienced the events? This book's new,
multifaceted approach toward Zippi's unique story combined with the
authors' analysis of key aspects of Holocaust memory, its forms and
its functions, makes it a rewarding and fascinating read.
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Holocaust Testimony and its Transformations
Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9780199799015
Publisert
2020
Utgave
1. utgave
Utgiver
Oxford University Press Academic US
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter