In the decade after the Second World War, 35,000 Jewish survivors of Nazi persecution and their dependants arrived in Canada. This was a watershed moment in Canadian Jewish history. The unprecedented scale of the relief effort required for the survivors, compounded by their unique social, psychological, and emotional needs challenged both the established Jewish community and resettlement agents alike. Adara Goldberg’s Holocaust Survivors in Canada highlights the immigration, resettlement, and integration experience from the perspective of Holocaust survivors and those charged with helping them. The book explores the relationships between the survivors, Jewish social service organizations, and local Jewish communities; it considers how those relationships—strained by disparities in experience, language, culture, and worldview—both facilitated and impeded the ability of survivors to adapt to a new country. Researched in basement archives and as well as at Holocaust survivors’ kitchen tables, Holocaust Survivors in Canada represents the first comprehensive analysis of the resettlement, integration, and acculturation experience of survivors in early postwar Canada. Goldberg reveals the challenges in responding to, and recovering from, genocide—not through the lens of lawmakers, but from the perspective of “new Canadians” themselves.
"I set out to find a group of people who, like me, were possessed by a history they had never lived." The daughter of Holocaust survivors, Helen Epstein traveled from America to Europe to Israel, searching for one vital thin in common: their parent's persecution by the Nazis. She found: • Gabriela Korda, who was raised by her parents as a German Protestant in South America; • Albert Singerman, who fought in the jungles of Vietnam to prove that he, too, could survive a grueling ordeal; • Deborah Schwartz, a Southern beauty queen who—at the Miss America pageant, played the same Chopin piece that was played over Polish radio during Hitler's invasion. Epstein interviewed hundreds of men and women coping with an extraordinary legacy. In each, she found shades of herself.
In Delayed Impact Franklin Bialystok explores the evolution of the legacy of the Holocaust in the collective memory of the post-war Canadian Jewish community. He seeks to understand why the Holocaust's effect was relatively muted up to 1960, moved to the forefront with the rise of antisemitism in the 1960s, and became a prominent concern and marker for Jewish ethnic identity after 1973. Bialystok begins by examining the years immediately following World War II, showing that Canadian Jews were not psychologically equipped to comprehend the enormity of the Holocaust. Unable to grasp the extent of the atrocities that had occurred in a world that was not theirs, Canadian Jews were not prepared to empathize with the survivors and a chasm between the groups developed and widened in the next two decades. He shows how the efflorescence of marginal but vicious antisemitism in Canada in the 1960s, in combination with more potent antisemitic outrages internationally and the threat to Israel's existence, led to an interest in the Holocaust. He demonstrates that with the politicisation of the survivors and the maturation of the post-war generation of Canadian Jews in the 1980s, the memory of the Holocaust became a pillar of ethnic identity. Combining previously unexamined documents and interviews with leaders in the Jewish community in Canada, Bialystok shows how the collective memory of an epoch-making event changed in reaction to historical circumstances. His work enhances our understanding of immigrant adaptation and ethnic identification in a multi-cultural society in the context of the post-war economic and social changes in the Canadian landscape and sheds new light on the history of Canadian Jewry, opening a new perspective on the effects of the Holocaust on a community in transition. Franklin Bialystok is a part-time lecturer in the Department of History at the University of Toronto and the University of Waterloo. He has published numerous articles on the Holocaust in various journals and edited collections.
As the Holocaust is memorialized worldwide through education programs and commemoration days, the common perception is that after survivors arrived and settled in their new homes they continued on a successful journey from rags to riches. While this story is comforting, a closer look at the experience of Holocaust survivors in North America shows it to be untrue. The arrival of tens of thousands of Jewish refugees was palpable in the streets of Montreal and their impact on the existing Jewish community is well-recognized. But what do we really know about how survivors’ experienced their new community? Drawing on more than 60 interviews with survivors, hundreds of case files from Jewish Immigrant Aid Services, and other archival documents, The Montreal Shtetl presents a portrait of the daily struggles of Holocaust survivors who settled in Montreal, where they encountered difficulties with work, language, culture, health care, and a Jewish community that was not always welcoming to survivors. By reflecting on how institutional supports, gender, and community relationships shaped the survivors’ settlement experiences, Abramson and Lynch show the relevance of these stories to current state policies on refugee immigration.
A New York Times Bestseller “I’ll be forever changed by Dr. Eger’s story…The Choice is a reminder of what courage looks like in the worst of times and that we all have the ability to pay attention to what we’ve lost, or to pay attention to what we still have.”—Oprah “Dr. Eger’s life reveals our capacity to transcend even the greatest of horrors and to use that suffering for the benefit of others. She has found true freedom and forgiveness and shows us how we can as well.” —Desmond Tutu, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate “Dr. Edith Eva Eger is my kind of hero. She survived unspeakable horrors and brutality; but rather than let her painful past destroy her, she chose to transform it into a powerful gift—one she uses to help others heal.” —Jeannette Walls, New York Times bestselling author of The Glass Castle Winner of the National Jewish Book Award and Christopher Award At the age of sixteen, Edith Eger was sent to Auschwitz. Hours after her parents were killed, Nazi officer Dr. Josef Mengele, forced Edie to dance for his amusement and her survival. Edie was pulled from a pile of corpses when the American troops liberated the camps in 1945. Edie spent decades struggling with flashbacks and survivor’s guilt, determined to stay silent and hide from the past. Thirty-five years after the war ended, she returned to Auschwitz and was finally able to fully heal and forgive the one person she’d been unable to forgive—herself. Edie weaves her remarkable personal journey with the moving stories of those she has helped heal. She explores how we can be imprisoned in our own minds and shows us how to find the key to freedom. The Choice is a life-changing book that will provide hope and comfort to generations of readers.
A New York Times Critics’ Best Nonfiction Book of 2021 Canadian Jewish Literary Award for Biography From a gifted young writer, the story of his quest to reclaim his family’s apartment building in Poland—and of the astonishing entanglement with Nazi treasure hunters that follows Menachem Kaiser’s brilliantly told story, woven from improbable events and profound revelations, is set in motion when the author takes up his Holocaust-survivor grandfather’s former battle to reclaim the family’s apartment building in Sosnowiec, Poland. Soon, he is on a circuitous path to encounters with the long-time residents of the building, and with a Polish lawyer known as “The Killer.” A surprise discovery—that his grandfather’s cousin not only survived the war, but wrote a secret memoir while a slave laborer in a vast, secret Nazi tunnel complex—leads to Kaiser being adopted as a virtual celebrity by a band of Silesian treasure seekers who revere the memoir as the indispensable guidebook to Nazi plunder. Propelled by rich original research, Kaiser immerses readers in profound questions that reach far beyond his personal quest. What does it mean to seize your own legacy? Can reclaimed property repair rifts among the living? Plunder is both a deeply immersive adventure story and an irreverent, daring interrogation of inheritance—material, spiritual, familial, and emotional.
A Powerful, Life-Affirming New Perspective on the Holocaust Almost ninety children and grandchildren of Holocaust survivors—theologians, scholars, spiritual leaders, authors, artists, political and community leaders and media personalities—from sixteen countries on six continents reflect on how the memories transmitted to them have affected their lives. Profoundly personal stories explore faith, identity and legacy in the aftermath of the Holocaust as well as our role in ensuring that future genocides and similar atrocities never happen again. There have been many books and studies about children of Holocaust survivors—the so-called second and third generations—with a psycho-social focus. This book is different. It is intended to reflect what they believe, who they are and how that informs what they have done and are doing with their lives. From major religious or intellectual explorations to shorter commentaries on experiences, quandaries and cultural, political and personal affirmations, almost ninety contributors from sixteen countries respond to this question: how have your parents’ and grandparents’ experiences and examples helped shape your identity and your attitudes toward God, faith, Judaism, the Jewish people and the world as a whole? For people of all faiths and backgrounds, these powerful and deeply moving statements will have a profound effect on the way our and future generations understand and shape their understanding of the Holocaust. Praise from Pope Francis for Menachem Rosensaft’s essay reconciling God’s presence with the horrors of the Holocaust: “When you, with humility, are telling us where God was in that moment, I felt within me that you had transcended all possible explanations and that, after a long pilgrimage—sometimes sad, tedious or dull—you came to discover a certain logic and it is from there that you were speaking to us; the logic of First Kings 19:12, the logic of that ‘gentle breeze’ (I know that it is a very poor translation of the rich Hebrew expression) that constitutes the only possible hermeneutic interpretation. “Thank you from my heart. And, please, do not forget to pray for me. May the Lord bless you.” —His Holiness Pope Francis Contributors include: Justice Rosalie Silberman Abella of the Supreme Court of Canada Historian Ilya Altman, cofounder and cochairman, Russian Research and Educational Holocaust Center, Moscow New York Times reporter and author Joseph Berger, New York Historian Eleonora Bergman, former director, Jewish Historical Institute, Warsaw Vivian Glaser Bernstein, former cochief, Group Programmes Unit, United Nations Department of Public Information, New York Michael Brenner, professor of Jewish history and culture, Ludwig-Maximilians University of Munich; chair in Israel studies, American University, Washington, DC Novelist and poet Lily Brett, winner of the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize Award, New York New York Times deputy national news editor and former Jerusalem bureau chief Ethan Bronner, New York Stephanie Butnick, associate editor, Tablet Magazine, New York Rabbi Chaim Zev Citron, Ahavas Yisroel Synagogue and Yeshiva Ohr Elchonon Chabad, Los Angeles Dr. Stephen L. Comite, assistant clinical professor of dermatology, Mount Sinai Hospital, New York Elaine Culbertson, director of a program taking American high school teachers to study Holocaust sites, New York Former Israeli Minister of Internal Security and Shin Bet director Avi Dichter, Israel Lawrence S. Elbaum, attorney, New York Alexis Fishman, Australian actor and singer Shimon Koffler Fogel, CEO, Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, Ottawa Dr. Eva Fogelman, psychologist and author, New York Associate Judge Karen “Chaya” Friedman of the Circuit Court of Maryland Natalie Friedman, dean of studies and senior class dean, Barnard College, New York Michael W. Grunberger, director of collections, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, DC David Harris, executive director, American Jewish Committee, New York Author Eva Hoffman, recipient of the Jean Stein Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, London Rabbi Abie Ingber, executive director, Center for Interfaith Community Engagement, Xavier University, Cincinnati, OH Josef Joffe, editor-publisher, Die Zeit, Germany Rabbi Lody B. van de Kamp, author; former member of the Chief Rabbinate of Holland and the Conference of European Rabbis, Holland Rabbi Lilly Kaufman, Torah Fund director, The Jewish Theological Seminary of America, New York Filmmaker Aviva Kempner, Washington, DC Cardiologist Dr. David N. Kenigsberg, Plantation, FL Author and Shalom Hartman Institute fellow Yossi Klein Halevi, Israel Attorney Faina Kukliansky, chairperson, Jewish Community of Lithuania, Vilnius Rabbi Benny Lau, Ramban Synagogue, Jerusalem Amichai Lau-Lavie, founding director, Storahtelling, Israel/New York Philanthropist Jeanette Lerman- Neubauer, Philadelphia Hariete Levy, insurance actuary, Paris Annette Lévy-Willard, journalist and author, Paris Rabbi Mordechai Liebling, Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, Philadelphia Knesset member Rabbi Dov Lipman, Israel Rabbi Michael Marmur, provost, Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion, Jerusalem International banker Julius Meinl, president, Euro-Asian Jewish Congress, Prague Knesset member and former journalist Merav Michaeli, Israel The Right Honourable David Miliband, former foreign secretary, United Kingdom; president, International Rescue Committee, New York Tali Nates, director, Johannesburg Holocaust and Genocide Centre, South Africa Eric Nelson, professor of government, Harvard University Eddy Neumann, esq., Sydney, Australia Mathew S. Nosanchuk, Director for Outreach, National Security Council, the White House, Washington, DC Artist and author Aliza Olmert, Jerusalem Couples therapist Esther Perel, New York Sylvia Posner, administrative executive to the Board of Governors, Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion, New York Rabbi Joseph Potasnik, executive vice president, New York Board of Rabbis Dr. Richard Prasquier, past president, Conseil Représentatif des Institutions Juives de France (Representative Council of French Jewish Institutions), Paris Richard Primus, professor of law, University of Michigan Law School Professor Shulamit Reinharz, director, the Women’s Studies Research Center and the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, Brandeis University, MA Chaim Reiss, CFO, World Jewish Congress Jochi (Jochevet) Ritz-Olewski, former vice dean of academic studies, The Open University of Israel Moshe Ronen, vice president, World Jewish Congress; former president, Canadian Jewish Congress, Toronto Novelist and Fordham University law professor Thane Rosenbaum, New York Rabbi Dr. Bernhard H. Rosenberg, Congregation Beth-El, Edison, NJ Art historian and museum director Jean Bloch Rosensaft, New York Menachem Z. Rosensaft, general counsel, World Jewish Congress and professor of law, New York Hannah Rosenthal, former U.S. State Department special envoy to monitor and combat anti-Semitism, Wisconsin Rabbi Judith Schindler, Temple Beth El, Charlotte, NC Clarence Schwab, equity investor, New York Cantor Azi Schwartz, Park Avenue Synagogue, New York Ghita Schwarz, senior attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights, New York Psychologist Dr. David Senesh, Tel Aviv Florence Shapiro, former mayor, Plano, Texas, and former state senator, Texas Rabbi Kinneret Shiryon, Kehillat YOZMA, Modi’in, Israel David Silberklang, senior historian, Yad Vashem, Israel Documentary film maker and author André Singer, London Peter Singer, professor of bioethics, Princeton University Robert Singer, CEO and executive vice president, World Jewish Congress Psychologist Dr. Yaffa Singer, Tel Aviv Sam Sokol, reporter, The Jerusalem Post, Israel Philanthropist Alexander Soros, New York Rabbi Elie Kaplan Spitz, Congregation B’nai Israel, Tustin, CA Michael Ashley Stein, executive director, Harvard Law School Project on Disability Rabbi Kenneth A. Stern, Congregation Gesher Shalom, Fort Lee, NJ Maram Stern, associate CEO for diplomacy, World Jewish Congress, Brussels Carol Kahn Strauss, international director, Leo Baeck Institute, New York Aviva Tal, lecturer in Yiddish literature, Bar Ilan University, Israel Professor Katrin Tenenbaum, scholar on modern Jewish culture and philosophical thought, University of Rome Dr. Mark L. Tykocinski, dean, Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia Rabbi Moshe Waldoks, Temple Beth Zion, Brookline, MA Psychologist Diana Wang, president, Generaciones de la Shoá en Argentina, Buenos Aires Author Ilana Weiser-Senesh, Tel Aviv Jeffrey S. Wiesenfeld, former senior aide to New York Governor George Pataki and U.S. Senator Alfonse D’Amato U.S. Senator Ron Wyden, Oregon Sociologist Tali Zelkowicz, Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion, Los Angeles
Women and Holocaust: New Perspectives and Challenges expands the existing scholarship on women and the Holocaust adopting current approaches to gender studies and focusing on the texts and context from Central-Eastern Europe. The authors complicate earlier approaches by considering the intersections of gender, region, nationa, and sexuality, often within specifically delineated national settings, including the Czech/German, Hungarian, Hungarian/Austrian, Lithuanian, Polish/Israeli, Romanian/US-American, and Slovak. In these essays, the communist regimes after WWII often provide a productive framework for studying women and the Holocaust. This truly international volume features contributions by eminent authors, including pioneers in the field, as well as upcoming literary scholars and historians who delve into previously unmapped archives, explore cinematic representations and digital testimonies.
Spanning more than two hundred years of history, from the eighteenth century to the twenty-first, Sisters or Strangers? explores the complex lives of immigrant, ethnic, and racialized women in Canada. Among the themes examined in this new edition are the intersection of race, crime, and justice, the creation of white settler societies, letters and oral histories, domestic labour, the body, political activism, food studies, gender and ethnic identity, and trauma, violence, and memory. The second edition of this influential essay collection expands its chronological and conceptual scope with fifteen new essays that reflect the latest cutting-edge research in Canadian women's history. Introductions to each thematic section include discussion questions and suggestions for further reading, making the book an even more valuable classroom resource than before.
Spanning two hundred years of history from the nineteenth century to the 1990s, Sisters or Strangers? explores the complex lives of immigrant, ethnic, and racialized women in Canada. The volume deals with a cross-section of peoples - including Japanese, Chinese, Black, Aboriginal, Irish, Finnish, Ukrainian, Jewish, Mennonite, Armenian, and South Asian Hindu women - and diverse groups of women, including white settlers, refugees, domestic servants, consumer activists, nurses, wives, and mothers. The central themes of Sisters or Strangers? include discourses of race in the context of nation-building, encounters with the state and public institutions, symbolic and media representations of women, familial relations, domestic violence and racism, and analyses of history and memory. In different ways, the authors question whether the historical experience of women in Canada represents a 'sisterhood' of challenge and opportunity, or if the racial, class, or marginalized identity of the immigrant and minority women made them in fact 'strangers' in a country where privilege and opportunity fall according to criteria of exclusion. Using a variety of theoretical approaches, this collaborative work reminds us that victimization and agency are never mutually exclusive, and encourages us to reflect critically on the categories of race, gender, and the nation.
