Re-Presenting the Shoah for the 21st Century (Hardcover)

Ronit Lentin
 9781571818027
1-57181-802-2

Despite Adorno's famous dictum, the memory of the Shoah features prominently in the cultural legacy of the 20th century and beyond. It has led to a proliferation of works of representation and re-memorialization.

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which have brought in their wake concerns about a 'holocaust industry' and banalization. This volume sheds fresh light on some of the issues, such as the question of silence and denial, of the formation of contemporary identities -- German, East European, Jewish or Israeli, the consequences of the legacy of the Shoah for survivors and for the 'second generation, ' and the political, ideological, and professional implications of Shoah historiography. One of the conclusions to be drawn from this volume is that the 'Auschwitz code, ' invoked in relation to all 'unspeakable' catastrophes, has impoverished our vocabulary; it does not help us remember the Shoah and its victims, but rather erases that memory.