Language:
German
Year of publication:
2006
Titel der Quelle:
Exil
Angaben zur Quelle:
26,1 (2006) 52-70
Keywords:
Friedländer, Saul,
;
Jewish children in the Holocaust
;
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) Personal narratives
Abstract:
Discusses the functionality of collective memory through research of autobiographical texts by authors who experienced Nazi persecution as children, and who approach their experiences from the perspective of adulthood. Analyzes Friedländer's memoir "Quand vient le souvenir" (1978) and his view that "historical consciousness" is a necessary conjunction of both past and present in any significant attempt at understanding, explicating, and representing the yesterday that affects the shaping of today. Historiographic depictions of events which are part of the personal memory of the historian enable insights which are otherwise not accessible. Argues that Friedländer's writings on the Holocaust focus less on his own past and more on a coping with the processes of memory and their role in the formation of a specific identity. Moreover, his critical attitudes toward the Jewish state and the Israeli-Arab conflict are an outcome of his experiences during the war.
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