Des White Buses to Auschwitz de la Norvège aux Treni della Memoria italiens
Translated Title
From Norway's White Buses to Auschwitz to Italy's Treni della Memoria
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Abstract
My paper will focus on the Italian memorial trains to Auschwitz, which have become a very popular phenomenon that is still unparalleled in Europe. Namely, I will argue that they are an example of the deterioration of teaching about the Holocaust and the trivialization of Auschwitz. First, neither their pedagogy nor their methodology are sufficiently accurate because most of the teachers who take part in these projects have a passive attitude and fail to coordinate their students’ learning experience. Second, there is a lack of precision regarding the definition of historical facts, which leads to the use of unsuitable language. For instance, terms such as “political deportation,” “forced labor” and “the extermination of the Jews” are conflated. This lack of precision also leads to a moralizing of the Holocaust that risks overlooking and minimizing the specificity of the genocide.
Given the great success of the memorial trains and the initiative’s strong influence on the teaching of history, it is essential that we consider the ways in which teachers respond to the major challenge facing them: how to combine good history instruction with the moral lessons of Auschwitz.
Given the great success of the memorial trains and the initiative’s strong influence on the teaching of history, it is essential that we consider the ways in which teachers respond to the major challenge facing them: how to combine good history instruction with the moral lessons of Auschwitz.
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Volume/Issue
206
Page Number / Article Number
129-151
DOI
Link
Link to article including link to pdf, Des White Buses to Auschwitz de la Norvège aux Treni della Memoria italiens
Bibliographic Information
Des White Buses to Auschwitz de la Norvège aux Treni della Memoria italiens. 2017: 129-151. https://archive.jpr.org.uk/10.3917/rhsho.206.0129
