Twelfth International Conference on Religion & Spirituality in Society

Abstract

Despite Dara Horn’s affirmation that “People like dead Jews,” as a scholar concerned less with teaching ABOUT the Holocaust than with how we teach THROUGH the Holocaust to address contemporary challenges with racism, intolerance and hatred, I would argue that, for the vast majority of my students, it’s not so much that they like dead Jews but that those are the only Jews they have ever heard about. Drawing on Chimamanda Adichie’s concept of the “single story” as an incomplete narrative that “make[s] one story the only story,” I argue that, to combat antisemitism and other forms of racism today, as well as to build understanding that allows for constructive conversation across differences of faith and ideology, we must contextualize the Holocaust in a narrative that not only addresses the complexity of pre-war Jewish life, but explores the diversity of Jewish belief and expression today. Bishop Krister Stendahl’s first rule of religious understanding calls us to listen to the adherents of a faith, rather than its enemies. Yet in teaching the Holocaust, we frequently create a Jewish identity composed solely of tragedy and victimhood. Framing Holocaust studies through a lens that centers the intersectionality of identity – how culture, religion, language, sexuality, gender, and socio-econoomic status are intertwined – creates a space to explore the many ways in which individuals of the past perceived their Jewishness. Restoring such individuality can create connection and empathy, with people from the past as well as others today.

Presenters

Naomi Yavneh Klos
Rev. Bienvenu SJ Distinguished Chair of Humanities and Professor, Languages and Cultures, Loyola University New Orleans, Louisiana, United States