Devra Katz
Emotions in Stutthof: The Social Function of Emotions in a Prisoner Society
2018 | Full access
In 1941, Lucien Febvre, a French historian, penned his famous essay “Sensibility and History: How to Reconstitute the Emotional Life of the Past.” Set against the background of fascism and the horrors of the Nazi regime, it became clear to Febvre, who believed emotions to be irrational, that politics, and other aspects of intellectual life, were not immune to the influence of emotions. In response, he called for an examination of emotions in historiography to better understand why some societies were more adept than others at managing their feelings, and to “explain fascism and reveal the principles on which a more rational order could be constructed.” Though much has changed since 1941 surrounding the understanding of emotions, Febvre’s call paved the way for the development of emotions history into the discipline it is today.
This thesis applies emotions history methodology to the study of the Holocaust. Through an examination of three emotionally motivated social behaviors – giving and exchange, finding meaning and comfort, and helping behavior – this paper reveals patterns and tendencies of emotional expression among female and male prisoners inside the Stutthof concentration camp system. In doing so, it highlights how certain modes of emotional expression affected behavior and social life and subsequently promoted survival. The analysis demonstrates how emotions history is a useful methodology that illuminates previously underappreciated aspects of Holocaust historiography; challenges the notion that concentration camp prisoners completely succumbed to the emotional standards imposed on them by their perpetrators and lived in an emotionally void state; seeks to contribute to the greater understanding of concentration camp life using the Stutthof camp system as a case study; and sheds light on the more intimate and subterranean elements of victims’ experiences. The analysis is anchored in victims’ postwar written testimonies, and is supported by theories from the social sciences, mainly social psychology.
Supervisor:
Prof. Amos Goldberg