Förintelsen närvaro i nuet : En studie om hur minnen från ett traumatiskt förflutet lever kvar hos vuxna barn till Förintelseöverlevande.

Sammanfattning: This masters thesis examines children of Holocaust survivors otherwise known as second-generation survivors. The aim is to research how memories from a traumatic past, which affected the survivor’s parents during the Holocaust, lives on and continues to affect the lives of those who were not there to experience them. The study examines the life stories presented by children of Holocaust survivors in Swedish journalist and author Bernt Hermele’s podcast Överlevarna –Andra generationen (English translation Survivors – Second-Generation). The study approaches the second-generation survivor’s life stories via a theoretical framework that combines Jörn Rüsens theory of historical narrative and Marianne Hirsch concept of postmemory. By using this new theoretical approach to children of survivor’s life stories the study manages to investigate how the past become and remain important for children of survivors. From the analysis several results surrounding how, the past remains relevant can be discerned. Firstly, that the second-generation survivors in Sweden exhibits a postmemory. This postmemory however should not always be interpreted as traumatic and does not over necessarily overshadow other joyful family memories. The children of survivors negotiate their identity as second-generation survivors and there is no uniform answer to what it actually means to be a second-generations survivor. The main identity discussed by the second-generation is their Jewish identity. However, their Jewish identity does not mainly come from religious beliefs but rather from their relationship to their parents and their parent’s behaviour during childhood. Due to their postmemory, some second-generation survivors show a continuous search for their parents and their parent’s stories. In lack of answers, they use experiences from the present that can be interpreted and applied on their parents for increased understanding of them. This phenomenon can be referred to as postmemory-continuity. Lastly the act of telling and retelling their own and their parent’s stories is presented as a meaningful act for second-generation survivors. This is due to the fact that telling becomes a way to resist and prevent antisemitism and racism and increase tolerance insociety in the future.