Language:
English
Year of publication:
1999
Titel der Quelle:
Media, Culture and Society
Angaben zur Quelle:
21,4 (1999) 481-501
Keywords:
Gender identity
;
Sex role
;
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)
;
Holocaust survivors
;
Nazi concentration camps
Abstract:
Gender is a factor in Nazi policy toward the Jews that has not yet been understood. Some aspects relate to biology, e.g. the sterilization of Jewish women or forcing them to commit infanticide when pregnant. Others relate to culture, e.g. eliminating possibilities of feminism. Neither the process of selection for death at extermination camps (half of the men vs. three-quarters of the women) nor methods of extermination were gender neutral. Specifically feminine experiences are sometimes discussed in Holocaust memoirs. In this context, provision of lipstick to survivors of Belsen by the Allies signified a "return of gender... of Jewish women's femininity, an aspect of humanity, along with Jewish men and women, that Nazi policies attempted to destroy."
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