Women in the Holocaust

by Professor Dalia Ofer (Editor), Lenore J. Weitzman (Editor)

As Jews throughout Europe faced Nazi persecution, Jewish women?wives, daughters, mothers?encountered special problems and had particular vulnerabilities. This is the first book of original scholarship devoted to women in the Holocaust. By examining women’s unique responses, their incredible resourcefulness, their courage, and their suffering, the book enhances our understanding of the experiences of all Jews during the Nazi era.

The introductory essay by Lenore Weitzman and Dalia Ofer stakes out new intellectual territory and shows how questions about gender lead to a richer and more finely nuanced understanding of the Holocaust. Testimonies of Holocaust survivors, written especially for this book, shed light on women’s lives in the ghettos, the Jewish resistance movement, and the concentration camps. The narratives personalize and exemplify many of the larger themes explored in other chapters by Holocaust historians, sociologists, and literary experts. These chapters explore the variety and complexity of gender differences during the Holocaust. The culturally defined prewar roles of Jewish men and women endowed them with different spheres of knowledge, expertise, and skills with which to face the Nazi onslaught. During the war the Nazis imposed different regulations, work requirements, and sanctions on the two sexes. Women had to assume new roles as family protectors during the ghetto period, when men were more vulnerable. In contrast women, and especially mothers, were more vulnerable in the concentration camps. The detailed portraits of women in these chapters show us their individuality, strength, and humanity.

Contributors to this

Gershon Bacon

Yehuda Bauer

Daniel Blatman

Gisela Bock

Ruth Bondy

Liza Chapnik

Ida Fink

Myrna Goldenberg

Sara R. Horowitz

Paula E. Hyman

Marion Kaplan

Felicja Karay

Bronka Klibansk

Lawrence L. Langer

Dalia Ofer

Renée Poznanski

Joan Ringelheim

Nechama Tec

Michal Unger

Lidia Rosenfeld Vago

Lenore J. Weitzman

Genres: History, Holocaust, Nonfiction

416 pages, Hardcover

First published March 30, 1998

Reviews

[Caley Brennan · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent collection of detailed accounts of Jewish women’s experiences of the Holocaust, from the beginning of Nazi antisemitism to survivor stories and depiction of women in Holocaust literature. It does a remarkable job at focusing on the gender-specific experiences of women during this period while also reflecting the fact that the Nazis’ genocidal intent towards all Jews was the same, regardless of gender.

[Mollie Carson · Rating 5 out of 5]

incredible work. i understand why Langer's chapter was included but i found myself raging the whole time: you're describing a gendered experience while arguing we shouldn't consider gendered experience! to view the unique experience of women in a unique event is critical to understand the event itself! anyways, Ofer and Weitzman put together a really strong collection of essays and testimony that are foundational to my own work and I'm thankful they fought to explore women's experiences in a feminist lens.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent book for viewing the Holocaust through a different lens. I had my reservations about this book at first, but it grabbed my attention early and held on until the last page. I feel much enlightened after completing this book. It manages to address the sensitive subject of the Holocaust from a female perspective without the feminist attitude and without lessening or denigrating other perspectives. Well done!

[Jerra Runnels · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is so sad. I read it as part of a historiography on the sterilization and eugenic policies of the Nazi regime. This book brings a much needed voice to the millions of Jewish women who were victimized.