This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in Web of Science Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Web of Science (1) Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Dean, C. J. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

History writing, numbness, and the restoration of dignity

Department of History, Box N, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912-N, USA.Carolyn_Dean{at}brown.edu

This article investigates how historians have sought to foster empathic identification with victims in various narratives on the genocide of European Jewry. It takes historians’ extreme reactions to Daniel Jonah Goldhagen’s Hitler’s Willing Executionersas a point of departure, and argues that most historical narratives fail to address how graphic writing about atrocities generates identification with both perpetrators and victims. The essay then analyses how some historians have sought, successfully or not, to overcome this problem.

Key Words: dignity • empathy • identification • narrative • perpetrator

History of the Human Sciences, Vol. 17, No. 2-3, 57-96 (2004)
DOI: 10.1177/0952695104047298


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?