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| You are here: 2000 / Workshops, Panels and Seminars / Workshops on Remembrance and Representation / Workshop 5 on Remembrance, "Testimony in Remembrance" / Report from Workshop 5 on Remembrance: "Testimony in Remembrance" | |||||||||
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Participants Countries and organizations Conference documentation Conference programme 
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Report from Workshop 5 on Remembrance: "Testimony in Remembrance" Presentation by Mrs. Inge Deutschkron Presentation by Mrs. Hédi Fried Presentation by Mr. Arno Lustiger Report from Workshop 5 on Remembrance: "Testimony in Remembrance" Report from Workshop 5 on Remembrance and Representation Moderator: Professor David Cesarani
Summary: Presenters: Mrs. Inge Deutschkron Mrs. Hedi Fried Mr. Arno Lustiger Dr. Anette Wievorka Survivors are needed to help in the Educational Research and the Remembrance components of the Holocaust. Many individuals who could have helped in these efforts are no longer with us today. We therefore need the record of every man, woman and child who experienced this period of history. Our task is not only to secure testimony of survivors, but also to make this testimony available in a variety of settings and modalities. Remarks of Mrs. Inge Deutschkron: Although Inge Deutschkron lives in Israel, she often travels to Germany upon requests to speak to students in school settings. In 1982, finding schools for Inge to speak at was a difficult task. Seven years later in 1989, a book she had written about her life was turned into a successful play that was making the rounds of the theaters of Berlin. This play did not depict the atrocities of the Holocaust, but showed Inge Deutschkron’s life in Germany during the Holocaust. The popularity of this play helped create a demand for Inge to speak in schools. She also attributed this change in eagerness for information about the Holocaust to the fact the media had helped to spread the truth about the Nazis as well as the fact that the children in Germany in 1989 were not inhibited in speaking their minds about this terrible period of world history. Remarks of Mrs. Hedi Fried: Hedi explained that memory is what we want to remember; memory can be a friend or an enemy. Her memory as a child was the hunger and cold of the concentration camps, yet her memory was also of warm days with her parents. She told of her pain in remembering happy days when she was in misery. All she could do was to look forward to getting freed and telling her story. However even then she worried, “who would listen”? When she came to Sweden after liberation, after a short period of time telling her story, her friends asked when was she going to tell the truth. Her friends believed that no one could do such horrible things to innocent people. So, Hedi stopped telling her story. But this silence was heavy price for both Hedi and her community. For herself, she needed to verbalize her story, to have the chance to talk about it. For her community, they too paid the price with the rise of right wing movements. When she came to Sweden, she received physical help and care, but she also needed psychological assistance. She decided to stay in Sweden, believing that anti-Semitism would never occur in that country. But in the 1980’s, after hearing anti-Semitism on the radio, she thought about leaving. Hedi received tremendous support from the people of Sweden, who asked her to stay and to help in the fight against anti-Semitism. Although she had written a book about her experiences during the Holocaust, no company in Sweden would publish this book. But a friend from England helped her get her book published in England. After the popularity of her book was understood, the Swedish press relented and published her book also. Children read her book and related to the stories of a young girl growing up during the Holocaust. She began to get calls from schools to speak about her life in the concentration camps. She spoke not only about the Jewish people and other minorities, but about democratic Swedes too. When in more recent times questions have been raised about the very existence of the Holocaust, the Prime Minister of Sweden offered her book to any family in Sweden interested in hearing about the truth about the Nazi regime in Europe. Hedi believes that the psychological aspects of the Holocaust and survivors must be taught in the schools. People must use their memories to make a better future. The Jewish people and others who died in the Holocaust want their children’s children to live in a better world. Survivors are best suited to help build a better world by telling their story, to pass on their legacy. Remarks of Mr. Arno Lustiger: Arno Lustiger was born in Poland only five miles from the German border. During the period of German domination, he was placed in six concentration camps and had to endure death marches He relates with great sadness that a great deal of criticism is unjustly placed on Jews for not resisting during the Holocaust. His experiences and research shows that this was not the case. Arno provided a number of examples to refute the passivity issue (i.e. severity and speed of the German occupation forces, successful German propaganda efforts against resistance, etc.). Although a great deal of information is known about the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, little is known about other efforts of the Jewish resistance. For forty years after liberation, Arno Lustiger did not speak about his experiences during the Holocaust. Then he began to research, write and speak about resistance during the Holocaust. He believes that a role survivors can play is to correct the story of the resistance put up by the Jews in occupied Europe, show the relative successes of resistance and provide details of the real behavior of the victims of Nazi persecution. Remarks of Dr. Anette Wievorka: Anette Wievorks is an academic who writes history and about Holocaust history. She explained the role that personal diaries provide in maintaining information, because then events and facts are written down on paper. She also spoke how Yiddish poetry has been used as another form of producing humanistic memory books and generating information for future generations. But after the war she explained how hard it was for the stories of survivors to be told. The Nüremburg Trials used documents in the prosecution. But a big change came about during the Eichmann trial when survivors were asked to provide personal testimony during the trial. Because the public demanded information, this is the first time that many people spoke out. Now there was a demand for survivors to speak. But we must be careful when we read testimonies. We need to put remembrance into context and testimonies can be different when questions asked in different venues, in different times of a survivor’s life. Survivors have emotional periods (i.e. during Eichmann Trial), as well as memories of events thirty or forty years after they occurred. We must recognize these facts as we review testimonies of survivors. Questions from the audience: When survivors tell their story and humanize the Holocaust by creating empathy, does the listener loose the perspective of the horror of the phenomena (i.e. do students get empathy of what happened during the Holocaust and loose the picture of the horrors of the Holocaust)? RESPONSE: if confronted by something horrible in history, a listener will often tune out. But empathy and humanism help the listener stay focused and often encourages listeners to want to know more about a subject. Some survivors had such bad experiences that they wish to forget about that period in their life. Society often won’t let the survivor forget, society wants testimonies. Does society influence who will testify? RESPONSE: Some people do not want to provide testimonials, it should be a personal decision to speak out or to stay silent. We can all agree that the Holocaust did take place. But survivor’s testimonies after many years can sometimes become unclear and sometimes contradictory. Not all of the information that is being provided by governments may be accurate. Should governments provide a history of the Holocaust so that future generations may have the knowledge of the true facts of this period of history? RESPONSE: testimonies of survivors will always be influenced by the national context involved in which the testimony is provided. Political action of governments could have a negative effect of testimonies. We must be careful not to institutionalize or politicize testimonies. There are different levels of Holocaust understanding, including facts, relevancy and the integration of the Holocaust in relation to other genocides. Can concepts and principles derived from the Holocaust be applied to other situations where humans oppress and exploit each other? RESPONSE: How we teach information to our youth and our society is important. We must show that there is hope, that people, young and old alike can make a difference in the world, collectively or as individuals. Conclusions: There were three presentations by survivors from different backgrounds and perspectives and an academic overview. It was noted that there is no one single memory of the Holocaust. We must support all types of remembrance and facilitate contact with survivors. We must provide an environment where there is trust as well as a give and take atmosphere. In the past we shut out memory, now we have a chance to hear different voices telling a variety of stories. We must have the means to accomplish this task. To do the best job, we must work with historians and survivors. >> Back to top |
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Introduction Opening Session: Messages and speeches Plenary Sessions: Messages and speeches Workshops, Panels and Seminars
Other Activities |
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| For information about this production and the Stockholm International Forum Conference Series please go to www.humanrights.gov.se or contact Information Rosenbad, SE-103 33 Stockholm, Sweden | |||||||||