Citation

Jacobs J. Mem. Stud. 2008; 1(2): 211-225.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2008, SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/1750698007088387

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This research examines the representation of women at Auschwitz. Based on fieldwork at the museum/memorial at the death camp site, the study explores the complex ways in which women's experiences are recalled through gendered narratives that reify traditional representations of women as either suffering mothers and/or sexual possessions of the perpetrators. Drawing on the methods of visual sociology in ethnographic study, the imagery in photographs, sculptures and artifact installations is analyzed to reveal patterns of gendered memory that have become characteristic of Holocaust museum culture. The findings of the research raise significant questions for the social construction of gendered memories of atrocity and genocidal histories. In particular, the study suggests that, as nations and groups seek to accurately recall and remember mass violence against women, traumatized societies must be wary of creating visual and public narratives that promote voyeurism and exploit the memory of the dead.