Integrated Media Using Salvaged Pages Carrie A. Olson USHMM Teacher Fellow

“These writings capture the experience of young people from the inside—not as the Nazis decreed it, not as observers witnessed it, not as historians made sense of it after events occurred.” (Zapruder)

They observed and recorded: What they ate and how they dealt with hunger How they communicated. How they dealt with loss of home and family. How they continued to hope for a better future. They wrote with no knowledge of the outcome.

Alexandra Zapruder Voices on Antisemitism USHMM Podcast Series

Hope & Despair Anonymous Boy: Lodz Ghetto June 11, 1944, p. 371 July 15, 1944, p. 383 Compassion & Empathy Despair as Part of Suffering Anonymous Girl: Lodz Ghetto March 5, 1942, p. 234 Hope for Individual Survival Hope for the World Elsa Binder: Stanislawow, Poland January 30, 1942, p. 319

“These diaries remind us that even in the face of annihilation it can be a worthy act of defiance to write down your story and proclaim to the world, ‘I exist… I’m still here’” -Lauren Lazin director and Academy Award Nominee, Tupac: Resurrection

What are your immediate thoughts? Which images or diary passages stand out for you? What qualities set those diarists apart? What is new information you learned? What surprised you? What evoked a strong feeling? What questions did the film raise? What do you want to know more about? How did the voice of these young people add to your understanding of the Holocaust?

Zapruder saw how the writers shifted between varying perspectives, voices, and scopes of interest. Dawid Rubinowicz

She developed one organizing principle to untangle the shifting nature of the diarists’ writing by considering the different perspective or “worlds. Eva and Petr Ginz

Zapruder identified these ‘worlds’ as: 1) The internal world with the voice of reflecting; 2) The immediate world with the voice of reporting; 3) The external world with the voice of chronicling. Dawid Rubinowicz

The “world” is a model for students to engage in the process of literary analysis. Students will to learn that the diarists wrote for many different reasons, in many different styles and under very different circumstances. Elisabeth Kaufman

REPRODUCIBLE 13 Internal Perspective/Reflecting Most personal of these Reflecting voice Self-examination, their inner lives, their deepest thoughts and feelings. Matters of character, dreams, hopes Relationships and conflicts with family, friends, etc Faith, religion, and belief (or lack of belief) in God. Moshe Flinker

REPRODUCIBLE 14 Immediate World/Reporting One step removed from the internal one Daily lives or important events that occur within the writer’s personal Reporting tone, often devoid of emotion or personal reflection Great detail, with an emphasis on accuracy and specificity. Peter Feigel

REPRODUCIBLE 15 External World/Chronicling More removed from the personal life Chronicle a series of events as it happened to their community, or capture a Most literary forms of expression; Chroniclers capture in writing scenes and incidents See and sketch these moments for their generality Yitskhok Rudashevkski

How does each “world” inform you about the Holocaust? What factors impact how the diarists express themselves? As you read this excerpts, keep in mind the factors that shape your own “world” and voice.

How could you use this in your classroom?