by Nigel Rodenhurst
This paper can be broken down in to three sections. The first summarizes the current ‘state of play’ in theoretical approaches to Holocaust testimony and fiction/film with similar traits. In short, critics including LaCapra, Caruth and Langer use theory influenced by Freud’s later work on ‘trauma’. This is used to explain discrepancies in ‘trauma’ narratives which would otherwise be considered ‘postmodern’.
The second section looks at the ways in which female experience was written out of Holocaust history (as was the experience of Jews who were not from Eastern Europe), and the efforts of historians and anthropologists to address this imbalance.
The final section argues that these efforts should be extended to readings of Holocaust testimony in which female experience is analysed through a ‘one gender fits all’ method based on Freud’s later work on trauma. In short, Caruth, LaCapra and Langer all approach the testimony of male and female patients/witnesses as though men and women experience trauma in identical (male) ways. Following Kristeva’s work on feminine depression, I argue that it is now time not only to include women’s experience fully in Holocaust history, but also to respect the nuances of difference between the male and female psyche when discussing this experience.
