TY - JOUR
T1 - Crossing Borders: Conceptualising National Exhibitions as Contested Spaces of Holocaust Memory at the Auschwitz Birkenau State Museum
AU - Richardson, Alasdair
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was funded by internal research at the University of Winchester (UK).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 by the author.
PY - 2023/7/11
Y1 - 2023/7/11
N2 - This paper considers the presence and potential educational impact of national exhibitions within the Auschwitz Birkenau State Museum in Poland. It takes a constructivist, personal-theoretical approach, drawing from autoethnography to explore possible visitor experiences at two of the national exhibits. Through detailed reflection on the French exhibition (Block 20) and the Dutch exhibition (Block 21), the author conducts a thematic analysis on the content in order to consider the constructions and possible intentions of the narratives presented. This is used to consider how the (relatively unvisited) exhibitions might contribute to visitors’ developing understandings of the complex history of the Holocaust. Particularly, the author considers how the national exhibits might contribute to the education of young people at the museum, and, by extension, at other sites, memorials, or educational spaces. The paper concludes that the inclusion of these complex national narratives is vital in young people gaining an understanding of the Holocaust as a multi-layered event. The paper offers a model for enabling inclusive Holocaust Education that embraces: (1.) divergent historical narratives (such as those in the national exhibitions), (2.) young people’s emotional engagement and responses to those narratives, and (3.) the Holocaust (and its representations) as a ‘contested space’ of history.
AB - This paper considers the presence and potential educational impact of national exhibitions within the Auschwitz Birkenau State Museum in Poland. It takes a constructivist, personal-theoretical approach, drawing from autoethnography to explore possible visitor experiences at two of the national exhibits. Through detailed reflection on the French exhibition (Block 20) and the Dutch exhibition (Block 21), the author conducts a thematic analysis on the content in order to consider the constructions and possible intentions of the narratives presented. This is used to consider how the (relatively unvisited) exhibitions might contribute to visitors’ developing understandings of the complex history of the Holocaust. Particularly, the author considers how the national exhibits might contribute to the education of young people at the museum, and, by extension, at other sites, memorials, or educational spaces. The paper concludes that the inclusion of these complex national narratives is vital in young people gaining an understanding of the Holocaust as a multi-layered event. The paper offers a model for enabling inclusive Holocaust Education that embraces: (1.) divergent historical narratives (such as those in the national exhibitions), (2.) young people’s emotional engagement and responses to those narratives, and (3.) the Holocaust (and its representations) as a ‘contested space’ of history.
KW - Auschwitz Birkenau
KW - France
KW - Holocaust
KW - Netherlands
KW - contested space
KW - museums
KW - national exhibitions
KW - national narratives
UR - https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/9135c7b6-e498-339a-b215-3cc953d5d596/
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85175101094&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.3390/educsci13070703
DO - 10.3390/educsci13070703
M3 - Article
VL - 13
SP - 703
JO - Education Sciences
JF - Education Sciences
SN - 2227-7102
IS - 7
M1 - 703
ER -