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Holocaust Trauma and its Transgenerational Transmission in the Visegrad Countries
Author(s): Zana, Katalin; Bakó, Tihamér; Prot-Klinger, Katarzyna; Biedka, Łukasz; Szwajca, Krzysztof; Vrzgulová, Monika; Hapalová, Michaela; Sanders, Edel; Preiss, Marek
Date: 2025
Topics: Psychotherapy / Psychoanalysis, Psychology/Psychiatry, Trauma, Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial, Holocaust Survivors, Holocaust, Holocaust Survivors: Children of, Holocaust Survivors: Grandchildren of
Abstract: In the context of Central and Eastern Europe, the legacy of the Holocaust is still very much alive. The post-war silence on the impact of the Holocaust and the persistent stigmatization of Jews during the communistic era has affected coping within the intergenerational chain of Holocaust trauma. Sharing the Hungarian, Polish, Slovak and Czech experiences together shows both similarities (such as the conspiracy of silence) and differences (societal milieu, relation to Jewish population) in addition to original attempts at coping and treatment for the traumatic impact of the Holocaust. Contemporary authors on the topic of transgenerational transmission of trauma can build on the work of earlier pioneers such as Teréz Virág in Hungary, Maria Orwid in Poland, Peter Salner in Slovakia and Helena Klímová in the Czech Republic. The authors' shared experiences underscore the importance of systematic psychotherapy as a path to understanding and healing. Expanding treatment options for transgenerational trauma will be needed to prevent traumas in the future.
Oral History and the Holocaust in Slovakia: Selective and Contradictory Memories
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika
Topics: Ethnography, Holocaust Survivors, Holocaust, Holocaust Commemoration, Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial, Memory, Oral History and Biography
Abstract: Nearly thirty years ago, Monika Vrzgulová took part in the very first oral history research project aimed at Holocaust survivors in Slovakia. That project transformed her professional as well as her personal life. The Holocaust as a scholarly subject and the oral history method have stayed with her to this day. This book summarizes her findings and the experience she has acquired researching Holocaust memory, combining memory studies, oral history, autoethnography, and reflexive writing methods. It presents data from two international research projects which took part in Slovakia too and are available to experts and the public online. The insights gained from this research are contextualised with the social situation in a country that is trying to come to terms with its past after the fall of Communism.
Remembering the Holocaust after 1989: Slovakia More Than Thirty Years Later
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika
Editor(s): Srodecki, Paul; Kozlova, Daria
Date: 2023
Topics: Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial, Holocaust Memorials, Holocaust Commemoration, Post-1989
Interpreting Jewish – non-Jewish relations in two biographic narratives
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika
Editor(s): Vrzgulová, Monika; Hlavnika, J
Date: 2012
Topics: Jewish - Non - Jewish Relations, Holocaust Survivors, Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial, Oral History and Biography, Narrative
Holokaust na Slovensku: perspektíva divákov. Vyrovnaní s minulosťou?
Translated Title: The Holocaust in Slovakia: The Perspectives of Observers. Coping with the Past?
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika
Editor(s): Bitušíková, Alexandra; Luther, Daniel
Date: 2013
Topics: Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial, Memory, Trauma, Oral History and Biography, Interviews, Holocaust
Abstract: The captured memories and the public representations of Holocaust events in Slovakia are characterised by ambivalent evaluation of the events and by symptoms of silence or even disinterest and elimination of memories. They also bring much evidence on active or passive involvement of non-Jewish inhabitants of Slovakia in these events. The nature of interviews, their course, and the formulation of sentences suggested that it was “hard recollections”. The respondents rarely admitted explicitly that what happened to their Jewish neighbours contradicted their own morale and values. The fact that they are aware (at present) that they were part of inhumane processes leading to the genocide of Jews is apparent from the context of their testimonies and non-verbal expressions. Though the respondents involved in the research represent only one (very specific) part of the “silent majority” which formed the “Holocaust environment”, these circumstances highlight the fact that also non-Jewish witnesses of the wartime Slovak state and the Holocaust in Slovakia are traumatised by this experience.
Nevyrozprávané susedské histórie: Holokaust na Slovensku z dvoch perspektív
Translated Title: Untold neighborhood histories: The Holocaust in Slovakia from two perspectives
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika
Date: 2017
Topics: Attitudes to Jews, Holocaust Memorials, Holocaust Survivors, Jewish - Non - Jewish Relations, Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial
Abstract: Autorka v tejto publikácii sumarizuje svoje aktuálne poznatky získané dlhodobým výskumom problematiky holokaustu na Slovensku, jeho reflexie v spomienkach pamätníkov i obrazy šírené v súčasnej spoločnosti Slovenska. Zamýšľa sa nad možnosťami metódy oral history pri výskume tejto témy, jej úskaliami i pozitívami. Významné je pre ňu využitie tejto kvalitatívnej metódy zameranej na mikroúroveň spoločnosti, na subjektívne prežívanie veľkých dejín, priamy kontakt bádateľa s človekom, ktorý tieto udalosti prežil. Predstavuje jednotlivé dlhodobé výskumné projekty, ktoré autorka realizovala, ich výskumné vzorky, spôsob a podmienky práce. V tretej časti predstavuje spomienky na holokaust z dvoch perspektív: obetí (židovských pamätníkov) a divákov (ich nežidovských susedov, ktorí boli svedkami, no nie priamymi aktérmi diania). V závere sa zamýšľa nad vzťahom pamäti spomienkového spoločenstva a jeho vlastnými identitami, porovnáva spôsoby spomínania u židovských a nežidovských respondentov a uvažuje, čo prezrádzajú o vzťahoch medzi nimi a o ich vlastných referenčných skupinách.
Only a Beginning: The Sered' Holocaust Museum in Slovakia
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika
Date: 2019
Topics: Holocaust Memorials, Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial
The Memory of the Return of Slovak Holocaust Survivors
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika
Date: 2018
Topics: Attitudes to Jews, Holocaust Survivors, Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial, Memory, Oral History and Biography
Abstract: The Memory of the Return of Slovak Holocaust Survivors in Jewish and Non-Jewish Testimonies The study deals with the memories of Holocaust survivors and eye-witnesses based on oral history projects that were conducted in Slovakia. It focuses on the return of Holocaust survivors back home and examines the imagery used by survivors and Gentile witnesses to describe this process. The study highlights the diversity of people’s memories due to the differing perspectives of the Jewish and non-Jewish eye-witnesses of this historical period. The author juxtaposes the results of the analyses of testimonies of the post-war situation and the contact and relationships between Jews and non-Jews with the context of present-day memory-related policies in the Slovak Republic.
Memories of the Holocaust: Slovak bystanders
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika
Date: 2017
Topics: Holocaust, Holocaust Commemoration, Attitudes to Jews, Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial, Oral History and Biography, Memory
Abstract: This study focuses on the way witnesses of historical events communicate their past experiences – how and what they choose to recall. By acknowledging the role of subjectivity in the recollections, it represents an addition to the existing body of predominantly historical works on the Holocaust in Slovakia. The study recognizes that subjectivity is present on the microlevel of every society and thus influences how witnesses remember historical events. Narratives analyzed within this study also suggest the diversity of memory and recollection – a factor which needs to be appreciated in further research of life under both authoritarian and totalitarian regimes. It is this diversity that allows us to go beyond stereotypical interpretations of the past and the role of actors – be it “victims,” “perpetrators,” or “bystanders” – in historical processes.
The Club of Senior Citizens who Survived the Holocaust: A Case Study from Slovakia
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika
Date: 2021
Topics: Holocaust Survivors, Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial, Ageing and the Elderly, Interviews, Jewish Organisations, Memory, Oral History and Biography
Abstract: This paper chronicles the process of how an informal group of Holocaust survivors in Bratislava organized into a senior citizens club that gradually evolved into a source of civic activism directed at the majority of society. Based on qualitative research: repeated interviews with survivors in Bratislava about their experiences of the Holocaust and the Communist era, which the author has carried out from 1995 to the present. It also draws on other data acquired during discussions at the Senior Citizens Club (2005–2017) and active observations of the survivors as civic activists engaged in public discourse and educational events for the youth in 2006–2019.
Nevyrozprávané Susedské Histórie: Holokaust Na Slovensku Z Dvoch Perspektív
Translated Title: Untold Neighborhood History: The Holocaust In Slovakia From Two Perspectives
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika
Date: 2016
Topics: Holocaust, Holocaust Commemoration, Holocaust Survivors, Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial, Memory, Oral History and Biography
Abstract: Autorka v tejto publikácii sumarizuje svoje aktuálne poznatky získané dlhodobým výskumom problematiky holokaustu na Slovensku, jeho reflexie v spomienkach pamätníkov i obrazy šírené v súčasnej spoločnosti Slovenska. Zamýšľa sa nad možnosťami metódy oral history pri výskume tejto témy , jej úskaliami i pozitívami. Významné je pre ňu využitie tejto kvalitatívnej metódy zameranej na mikroúroveň spoločnosti, na subjektívne prežívanie veľkých dejín, priamy kontakt bádateľa s človekom, ktorý tieto udalosti prežil. Predstavuje jednotlivé dlhodobé výskumné projekty, ktoré autorka realizovala, ich výskumné vzorky, spôsob a podmienky práce. V tretej časti predstavuje spomienky na holokaust z dvoch perspektív: obetí (židovských pamätníkov) a divákov (ich nežidovských susedov, ktorí boli svedkami, no nie priamymi aktérmi diania). V závere sa zamýšľa nad vzťahom pamäti spomienkového spoločenstva a jeho vlastnými identitami, porovnáva spôsoby spomínania u židovských a nežidovských respondentov a uvažuje, čo prezrádzajú o vzťahoch medzi nimi a o ich vlastných referenčných skupinách.
Podoby antisemitismu v Čechách a na Slovensku v 20. a 21. století
Author(s): Vrzgulová, Monika; Kubátová, Hana
Date: 2017
Topics: Antisemitism, Holocaust, Main Topic: Antisemitism
Abstract: Kolektivní monografie o podobách antisemitismu v Čechách a na Slovensku analyzuje diskursivní a vizuální formy obrazu Žida v české a slovenské většinové společnosti. Příspěvky se zabývají otázkou, jak se v průběhu 20. a 21. století utvářel pojem „Žid“ nebo „židovský“ a jak se v souvislosti s tímto „cizím“ obrazem utvářel obraz „nás“ samotných. Autoři jednotlivých studií se ve svých analýzách tematicky obrací k otázce kontinuity a transformace těchto zrcadlových obrazů a zároveň zkoumají vztah identity a (politické) moci. Badatelé na příkladu Protektorátu Čechy a Morava, válečného slovenského státu, komunistického Československa, ale také soudobých reálií přesvědčivě ukazují, že antisemitismus není vázaný na skutečného nebo domnělého nepřítele, nýbrž na (sebe)legitimizační konstrukty. Předkládaná kniha je založena na využití dobového tisku, orálněhistorických životopisných rozhovorů, pamětí a archivních dokumentů. Také proto je publikace určena nejenom akademické obci a učitelské veřejnosti, ale všem zájemcům o fenomén antisemitismu, jeho projevy a vývoj ve 20. století a v současnosti.