DIMINISHING THE COMPLEXITY AND HORROR OF THE HOLOCAUST: USING SIMULATIONS IN AN ATTEMPT TO CONVEY HISTORICAL EXPERIENCES

by
Samuel Totten
University of Arkansas, Fayetteville

Introduction
In an effort to provide students with a "real sense" as to what
Jews suffered during the Holocaust, many teachers (including university
professors) latch on to the use of simulations. Many educators who
specialize in Holocaust education, along with many Holocaust survivors,
however, look askance at the use of such simulations.1 They believe that
the use of such devices not only provide a simplistic and unrealistic view
of tortuously complex and horrific situations, but minimize -- if not
inadvertently mock -- the significance of what the victims experienced.

The focus of this chapter is twofold: first, it delineates why and
how certain educators use simulations to teach their students about various
aspects of the Holocaust; and second, it argues that the use of such
simulations constitutes poor pedagogy as a result of its drastic
oversimplification of Holocaust history.

The Problematic Use of Simulations to Teach About the Holocaust
"The truth of the matter is that we need to use anything we can
find to allow students to make connections between their lessons and their
life" (a teacher on the Holocaust.listserve, July 26, 1995). This sentiment
expressed by one teach with regard to Holocaust education is,
unfortunately, shared by many others at the elementary through university
levels. Many teachers believe that simulations are an extremely desirable
pedagogical device for capturing student interest, and they claim this is
so for numerous reasons. First, they argue that simulations are one of the
most powerful ways to provide students with a sense as to what the victims
experienced. Second, they insist that through simulations, students are
able to glean insights into aspects of the history that they would not
likely gain via more traditional methods such as reading the history of the period.
Third, they argue that because simulations tap into the affective
domain and are so radically different from other classroom activities, they
thoroughly engage student interest and are capable of leaving lasting
impressions on students.

None of these arguments stands up under close scrutiny. As for the
first point, to suggest that one can approximate even a scintilla of what
the victims went through is sheer folly. Addressing the second and third
points, there are ample resources available -- such as primary
documents, first-person accounts of survivors and liberators, and powerful
and accurate documentaries -- that are informative, highly engaging,
thought-provoking, and memorable. If the study of such resources, along
with highly readable books and/or essays on the history of this period, do
not engage students then it is incumbent upon teachers to examine the
resources, pedagogical strategies, and learning activities they are using
and/or to evaluate whether their students are mature enough to study this
history.

Commenting on the use of simulations to attempt to convey to
students what the victims lived through (e.g., in the ghettos, during the
deportations, and in the concentration and death camps), Steven Feinberg, a
noted Holocaust educator who taught history at Wayland Middle School for
eighteen years and who now works as a Holocaust educator at the United
States Holocaust Memorial Museum, states:

I am very leery about using simulations to teach any
aspect of the Holocaust. While it may be appealing to some
educators to use simulations when addressing certain issues
raised by the Holocaust, I believe the result would be more
negative than positive. According William A. Nesbitt (1971),
the author of Simulation Games for the Social Studies
Classroom, 'the reality represented [in a simulation] is
reduced in size so that it is manageable. Only selected
aspects of the real situation are included in a simulation.
Developers of simulations reduce and simplify reality so
students can focus on selected aspects of reality.' This
simplification of reality can, when applied to a study of the
Holocaust, lead to a facile understanding of complex
issues and, worse, still, a trivialization of the Holocaust
(personal communication, July 17, 1991).

Examples of Typical Simulations Used by Teachers to Teach About the
Holocaust

Highlighted below are examples of simulations that some teachers
use to "recreate" certain aspects of Holocaust history in order to "place
students in the shoes of the victims." They were gleaned from various
sources: Holocaust curricula, articles in which teachers describe their use
of simulations, descriptions of simulations that teachers have shared over
the Internet on the Holocaust.listserve, and examples that teachers shared
with my colleagues and I as we presented sessions at conferences on
Holocaust education.

1. Prior to class, a 7th grade social studies teacher clears all
the desks from the middle of the room and draws a long, broad
rectangle in chalk on the floor. After the students enter, she
explains that today they are going to gain an understanding
of what it was like for the Jews to be deported to concentration
camps in cattle cars. After lining the kids up, she swiftly
marches them into the imaginary boxcar. As the space becomes
increasingly crowded, she urges them to squeeze tighter
together; and as they do so, she keeps feeding more students
into the space. When the last student is in, she pretends to slam
the imaginary door closed. Then, as they stand there, giggling,
complaining about their feet being stepped on, gently pushing
and shoving each other, she orders them quiet and then reads
them a selection from a first-person account that describes the
cattle cars. At the end of the "simulation," she announces, "Now
you have some idea as to what the Jews went through. You
should never forget it!" (Shared by a teacher at a workshop on
Holocaust education, July 1995, Washington, D.C.)

2. "My students and I spent...two weeks exploring Hitler's war
against the Jews and other 'undesirables': the historical events,
the facts and figures, the personal accounts. We watched
videos and read poem after poem, story after story. I was certain
my students were learning. I mean, I had brought in all this stuff;
surely now my ninth graders recognized the importance of our
study.

"To test my theory, I once again asked my students to take
out a sheet of paper. 'Imagine this is Germany during World War II,'
I instructed. 'Decide whether you'd rather be a Nazi soldier or a
Jew and explain why.' Most started writing, but one young man raised
his hand. With sincere curiosity, he asked, "Now which ones got
beaten up again?'

"My first impulse was to run from the room crying...I had
failed, and failed miserably....Thinking quickly, I told students
to clear their desk and give me their absolute, undivided attention.
'This mobile unit is now Germany in 1943," I told them with every
bit of total authority I could muster. 'I am Adolf Eichmann, a chief
administrator for the Final Solution. Decide now whether you are a
Nazi or a Jew. If you choose to be a Nazi, line up along the right
wall. If you choose to be a Jew, assemble in the left corner. You
may not choose to be an 'innocent' bystander. And I want silence.'

"I was surprised at how quickly and easily I assumed the
role of dictator. I was equally surprised at how quickly and easily my
students assumed their chosen roles....I instructed those students
who had congregated in the corner to remain silent while I took the
five students who had elected to be Nazis outside. I assigned each
one rank, naming one young woman my second-in-command. They
were to follow my orders to the letter, with no questions asked.
They readily agreed.

"Back in the room, I told one Nazi commander to select three
Jews for immediate extermination. "But how...,' he began. 'Do it,' I
commanded. He chose three students randomly and took them to the
other side of the room. I told the selected students they were now
dead and could not participate in the rest of the activities. There
were a few giggles, giggles that I immediately stifled with my newly found
dictator glare.

For the next 15 minutes my mobile unit was, for us, World War
II Germany. The tension became so thick that several times I
consider-ed stopping the activity. For instance, when I told one girl who
had elected to be a Jew to select two of her classmates for medical
experimentation, she at first refused. 'Choose now, or I take six,'
I barked. The girl, a Jehovah's Witness, replied with tears in her
eyes, 'Take me.' (Fierek, 1996, pp. 10-11).

3. "When I [Ginger Moore] was a sophomore in college, in a three-
week Winter term course on the Holocaust, the professors wanted
us to understand at least a little bit what trips in cattle cars
were like (most of us never having been inside a cattle car in our lives!).
So they had us squeeze into the approximate space on the floor, try
sitting (not possible), try moving (not possible), and then try to
imagine having to go to the bathroom (horrifying!). They also gave
us other qualifiers; we were indoors, not out with the weather and
temperature, it was light, we had had breakfast, and so forth. I know
I came away from it with a much clearer idea than words
or even pictures could have provided. While I'm sure it didn't
even come close to what the victims experienced, it did make a
connection with most of the students which we otherwise would
not have had. It was a way to avoid numbing. So we came away
not with the feeling that we really felt what the victims had
felt, but with a much clearer idea than we had had before"
(Ginger K. More, July 26, 1995, Holocaus.listserve.).

4. "The Auschwitz Platform: to allow students to consider the
arbitrary decisions made at Auschwitz and the effects on the
survivors who are aware that death has only been postponed:
a. The teacher should prepare a supply of blue cards and white
cards; b. As each student enters the class, give him/her a white
card or a blue card; c. All students holding blue cards should sit
on the teacher's left; all those holding white cards should sit on
the teacher's right; and d. After all of the students have been
seated, inform those with blue cards that they are to be
exterminated and their bodies burned in the gas chambers. Those
holding white cards will be allowed to live one more day at least;
e. Explain what happened on the notorious platform at Auschwitz
when the railroad cards delivered the prisoners to the camp and
life- and-death decisions were made, depending on sex, age, strength,
and the intended use of the prisoners; f. Allow the students to
express their feelings about the Auschwitz platform through
classroom discussion and/or writings
(Brewer, Bijwaard, Payne, 1987, pp. 46-47).

5. "You are a member of the Judenrat in the Warsaw Ghetto.
With the other members of that Council, you must select five
of your people in the ghetto to be removed from the transport
to a death camp. The Judenrat has been called into session to
discuss the people who are listed below as 'possible candidates'
for removal and eventual extermination. ...In your Council,
decide on five people who you as the Judenrat
will remove from the ghetto and send to the extermination
camp tomorrow morning"
(New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education, 1995, Unit IV., p. 49).

On the surface, such simulations may seem interesting and engaging.
Certainly, as mentioned above, they are vastly different from the typical
classroom fare that most students in the United States face in their
courses on a daily basis (Goodlad, 1985, pp. 229-232). That is, such
simulations move students from passive to active, literally involve student
movement, and are interactive. Yet, are such activities pedagogically
sound? Do they truly involve the students in a sound study of the history?
Do they truly provide students with accurate and deep insights into the
what the victims experienced? Are the students left with something more
than a sense that they have had fun for a period? Finally, in any way at
all, do such simulations possibly add insult to the horrific injury already
suffered by the survivors of the Holocaust?

In response to the first four questions, some teachers would answer
with a resounding "Yes!" One such person would likely be Hilve Firek, a
professor of education at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte,
who implemented one of the aforementioned simulations. Concerning the
impact of the simulation on her students, she writes:

...in some small way, I had engaged my students
in actual learning...For a brief second, [I] helped my ninth
graders find relevance in historical material they considered
as removed from them as the Trojan War. If nothing else, I
had them search their souls to consider if, given a choice,
they would rather kill than be killed...I have heard much too
often that what we teachers do in the classroom is not worth-
while. Most teachers I know who address the issues
surrounding the Holocaust are doing the best they can to
help students discover more about themselves and about
the nature of human existence itself. Without an understand
-ing of humanity, the Holocaust becomes just another footnote
in history to be memorized and regurgitated on some
standardized test. I chose instead to explore, with my
students, why we, as human beings, make the decisions
we do" (pp. 11, 12).

Such arguments are common, but naive. They set up straw men in assuming
that the only way to engage students in an exploration as to what it means
to be human and personally and socially responsible is through jejune
activities. That is not only anti-intellectual but disingenuous. As Sidney
Bolkosky, a noted Holocaust educator and co- author of the Holocaust
curriculum entitled Life Unworthy of Life, asserts: "Nothing about the
Holocaust needs dramatization" (Holocaust.listserve.July 27, 1995)

The Problems in Using Simulations for Teaching About the History of the
Holocaust and the Actions of the Perpetrators, Collaborators, Bystanders
and Victims

For many scholars, educators, and survivors, there are a host of
problems inherent in the use of simulations to teach about the Holocaust.
These include, but are not limited to, the following: they are invariably
simplistic; they frequently convey both skewed and incorrect information
vis-a-vis the Holocaust; and more often than not, they are ahistorical. The
simple fact is, no matter what a teacher and his/her students do in a
simulation, they will never, ever, even begin to approximate or simulate
the horror that the victims suffered at the hands of the Nazis. Finally,
and this is of critical importance, the use of such simulations often
result in students believing that -- at least to a certain extent --
they do.

As for the problematic nature of using simulation activities to
study complex human behavior for the purpose of helping students to
"experience" unfamiliar situations, Totten and Feinberg (1995) argue that

It needs to be understood that helping students in the
course of a discussion or in a writing activity to explore a
different perspective or to "walk in someone else's shoes" is
different from involving a class in a simulation game. Likewise,
conducting a simulation in order to thoroughly engage in the
study of a concept is vastly different from conducting a simulation
in order to have students "experience" what it was like for a
victim to be jammed into a boxcar en route to a concentration camp or
killing center or to experience what it was like to live day-in- and
day-out under the threat of abject brutality and death.
...By their very nature, simulations are purposely toned
down in order to make them easier for students to grasp. As a
result, students who use simulations only end up being exposed
to an [absurdly] watered-down version of the actual situation.

When applied to a study of the Holocaust, this inevitably leads to
a facile oversimplification. It presents a skewed view of the
history, and often serves to reinforce negative stereotypes. Indeed, in
more cases than not, such simulations lead to a trivialization of
the Holocaust. Such situations can also degenerate into a time of "play"
that is bereft of real thinking. In the end, students often
remember the excitement of the game to the exclusion of the intended
meaning of the exercises or its relationship to the history under
examination
(pp. 331-332).

Further, in speaking of simulations, the authors of the United States Holocaust
Memorial Museum's Guidelines for Teaching About the Holocaust , note that

Holocaust survivors and eyewitnesses are among the
first to indicate the grave difficulty of finding words to describe
their experiences. Even more revealing, they argue the virtual
impossibility of trying to simulate accurately what it was like to
live on a daily basis with fear, hunger, disease, unfathomable
loss, and the unrelenting threat of abject brutality and death.
...Since there are numerous primary source accounts,
both written and visual, as well as survivors and eyewitnesses
who can describe actual choices faced and made by individuals
groups, and nations during this period, teachers should draw
upon these resources and refrain from simulations that lead to a
trivialization of the subject matter (italics added) (Parsons and
Totten, 1994, pp. 7-8).

In her criticism of classroom simulations to teach about the Holocaust,
historian and Holocaust scholar Lucy Dawidowicz (1992) notes
and then asserts that

Besides lectures, readings, films, and discussions, most
of the curricula [on the Holocaust which she discusses in her
essay "How They Teach the Holocaust"] use simulation games or
role-playing to teach their moral lessons. Students play Gestapo,
Concentration Camp, and Nuremberg Trial. They act out the roles
of murderers, victims, judges (p. 71)....The Jews who lived under
Hitler's rule were confronted with cruel dilemmas, forced to make
difficult, even impossible, choices about matters of life and death
for which conscience could offer no direction and the past could
give no guidance. Yet many high-school curricula frivolously
suggest role-playing exercises in which students imagine how
they would behave if confronted with such dilemmas. What kind
of answers can come from American children who think of the
Gestapo as the name of a game?" (Dawidowicz, 1992, p. 80).

As previously stated, curriculum developers and teachers, alike,
and at all levels, need to face the simple but profound fact that there is
absolutely no way anyone , let alone secondary level students, will ever be
able to experience the terror, horror, stench, and butchery of what
millions went through as they humiliated and brutalized by the Nazis.
Indeed, no one but no one can even begin to approximate through simulations
or playroles what it was like to be forced from one's home, crammed into a
ghetto under the most horrific circumstances where people were literally
dying in the street from disease and starvation, or to be forced to undress
at the lip of a ditch full of dead and wounded people and stand and wait
until they, too, were shot and killed. Likewise, no one can experience, let
alone truly fathom, the horror of being crammed into a boxcar that was
either suffocatingly hot or literally freezing cold for days on end without
food or water in which people were urinating, defecating, going mad and
dying. As horrible as these images are, they do not even begin to
approximate what the victims experienced. To illustrate the stark fact of
this point, it is worth going to the victims themselves for descriptions of
the almost unbelievable horror and pain that they, their loved ones and
others were subjected to during the Holocaust period.

Yitskhok Rudashevski, a fourteen year old Lithuanian Jew, who kept
a diary while incarcerated in the Vilna Ghetto from June 1941 through April
1943, recorded the following on April 6, 1943:

The situation is an oppressive one. We now know
all the horrible details. Instead of Kovno, 5000 Jews were
taken to Ponar where they were shot to death. Like wild
animals before dying, the people began in mortal despair
to break the railroad cars, they broke the little windows
reinforced by strong wire. Hundreds were shot to death
while running away. The railroad line over a great distance
is covered with corpses (Holliday, 1995, p. 183).

In early October of 1943, he and some family members were discovered in
their hideout by the Nazis and taken to Ponar, where they were all
murdered.

Survivor Elie Wiesel (1990), tells this heartrending story of a
mother and her two children:

And in the city, the grand, ancient city of Kiev, that mother
and her two children in front of some German soldiers who are
laughing...[T]hey take one child from her and kill it before her
eyes... then, they seize the second and kill it too...She wants to die;
the killers prefer her to remain alive but inhabited by death...Then,
she takes the two little bodies, hugs them against their chest and
begins to dance...how can one describe that mother? How can
one tell of her dance? In this tragedy, there is something hurts
beyond hurting -- and I do not know what it is (p. 186).

Speaking about the nature and impact of the deportations on people,
Sonja Fritz, a survivor of Auschwitz, relates the following:

I remember very well the transports that came from Greece.
Some of the staff of Block 10 had to go to the ramp to shave the
hair of the new arrivals. The poor Greek girls had spent a long
time in cattle cars and their hair was full of lice and so infested
that we got blisters on our hands" (quoted in Shelley, 1991, p. 24).

In this recollection of arrival at a camp, a young girl speaks of
her shock, horror and dismay:

A fat S.S. woman said, "Take off everything." I think of my
mother and all these strange people naked, and the German
soldiers watching, and I cry. I had long, black, beautiful hair and
they cut it, not even. Then into the shower, many under one
shower, very little water, and so cold. Everything happened so
fast, no dress, no hair, nothing, wet and cold like an animal"
(Lewin, 1990, p. 46).

Upon his arrival at Auschwitz as a thirteen year old boy and
prisoner, Elie Wiesel was confronted with this scene:

Not far from us, flames were leaping up from a ditch,
gigantic flames. They were burning something. A lorry drew up
at the pit and delivered its load -- little children. Babies! Yes,
I saw it -- saw it with my own eyes...those children in the flames
(Wiesel, 1969, p. 42).

Speaking about a death march, Reska Weiss, a survivor, recalls that

Urine and excreta poured down the prisoners' legs, and
by nightfall the excrement, which had frozen to our limbs, gave
off its stench. We were really no longer human beings in the
accepted sense. Not even animals, but putrefying corpses
moving on two legs" (p.211).

To take something so horrific, so profoundly disturbing, so
overwhelming to those who lived through it, and to turn it into something
that becomes, for many though certainly not all, "fun and games," is to
make a mockery of what the victims lived through. No matter what teachers
say in regard to the supposed efficacy of such simulations, students know
full well that the simulation is simply a classroom activity that will last
approximately twenty-five to forty-five minutes before it is over.
Throughout the activity they, of course, know that they are in no real
danger, and that, ultimately, what they are experiencing is not much more
than a "game." And yet, again, at the end of the activity some teachers
and, who knows how many, students, actually think the class has experienced
something that approximates what the victims experienced.

For students to walk away thinking that they have either experienced
what a victim went through or to think that he or she has now
has a greater understanding of what the victims suffered is shocking in its
naiveté. Even more galling is for teachers to think that they have provided
their students with a true sense of what the victims lived through --
and/or to think they have at least approximated the horror and terror that
the victims experienced.

Whether one wishes to realize it or not, simulations are a waste of
precious classroom time. This is especially true since so little time
anyhow is given over to this history in our nation's classrooms. In light
of the fact that teachers at all levels are constantly battling the clock
and calendar due to the simple but profound and frustrating fact their
curriculum is so packed that they find it nearly impossible to "cover" all
of the topics they feel compelled and obligated to teach, it is imperative
that they use their time as wisely as possible. Thus, to attempt to teach
the Holocaust over several days (which is all the time most teachers
dedicate to this history) and then to do so with such simplistic devices as
simulations that leave students with a skewed view of this history simply
does not make sense.

A Need to Show Sensitivity to the Memory of the Victims and the Feelings
of the Survivors
Over and above the pedagogical inappropriateness of using
simulations to teach this history, there is the issue of being respectful
and sensitive to both the victims who perished at the hands of the Nazis as
well as the survivors of the Holocaust who are still haunted by what they
lived through. More specifically, those who exploit the subject of the
Holocaust to "engage" their students, to "get them really interested in
history," are, despite their best intentions, guilty of nothing less than
mindless vulgarity. Many survivors have said as much.

Although the following comments by Elie Wiesel (1990) are concerned
with certain films of the Holocaust, his comments are equally apropos
vis-a-vis the use of simulations to teach about the Holocaust:

How can one 'stage' a convoy of uprooted deportees
being sent into the unknown, or the liquidation of thousands
of men, women, and children? How can one 'produce' the
machine-gunned, the gassed, the mutilated corpses, when
the viewer knows that they are all actors, and that after the
filming they will return to the hotel for a well-deserved bath
and a meal? Sure, this is true of all subjects and of all films,
but that is also the point: the Holocaust is not a subject like
all the others. It imposes certain limits. ...In order not to betray
the dead and humiliate the living, this particular subject
demands a special sensibility, a different approach, a rigor,
strengthened by respect and reverence and, above all,
faithfulness to memory" (pp. 167-168).

Still addressing the production of films on the Holocaust --
but whose sentiments are equally apropos to the use of Holocaust
simulations in the classroom -- Wiesel asks,

"How can one explain such obscenity? How can anyone justify
such insensitivity?" (Wiesel, 1990, p. 170).

He further states that:

"Newcomers to this history appoint themselves experts...They
give the impression of knowing better than the victims or
the survivors how to name what Samuel Beckett called the unnameable...
[T]he temptation is generally reductionist, shrinking personalities to
stereotypes and dialogue to clichés. All is trivial and superficial, even
death itself..." (Wiesel, 1990, p. 171).

He concludes by asserting:

But then, the "experts" will ask, how do we transmit the
message? There are other ways to do it, better ways to keep
the memory alive. Today the question is not what to transmit but
but how. Study the texts -- such as the diaries of Emanuel
Ringelblum and Chaim Kaplan; the works by the historians Raul
Hilberg, Lucy Dawidowicz, Martin Gilbert, Michael Marrus. Watch
the documentaries, such as...Claude Lanzmann's Shoah, and
Haim Gouri's 81st Blow. Listen to the survivors and respect their
wounded sensibility. Open yourselves to their scarred memories,
and mingle your tears with theirs. And stop insulting the dead
(Wiesel, 1990, pp. 171, 172).

Conclusion
Whether teachers like to admit it or not, by using simulations to
try to provide students with a sense of what the victims of the Nazis were
subjected to, they are minimizing, simplifying, distorting and, possibly
even "denying" the complexity and horror of the Holocaust. These are strong
words and accusations but they are carefully chosen. By leaving students
with even a minimal notion that they possess sense as to what the victims
went through, teachers may be inadvertently playing into the hands of
Holocaust deniers hands who absurdly and falsely assert that "things were
not as bad as the Jews and other victims purport them to have been."

The best advice in regard to simulations intended to provide
students with a sense of Holocaust history, including what the victims
lived through and/or the choices that the perpetrators and victims made, is
to avoid them at all costs. Instead, as previously mentioned, teachers and
students should focus on examining the primary documents, the first-person
accounts, the accurate and well written histories, and the best films on
this subject.

Also, at this juncture in time, when survivors of the Holocaust and
liberators of the concentration and death camps are still alive, a teacher
could hardly do better than to provide his/her students with an opportunity
to listen to and engage in discussion with a survivor or a liberator --
one who was there and saw the degradation, the horror and the injustice up
close. The next best avenue is to view videotapes in which the survivors
and liberators tell about their experiences and/or to read their accounts
available in print. Such accounts, if carefully chosen, will leave
students with something they will never forget.

References:

Dawidowicz, Lucy (1992). "How They Teach the Holocaust," pp. 65-83. In Lucy
Dawidowicz' What Is the Use of Jewish History? New York: Schocken Books.

Feinberg, Stephen (February 17, 1991). Personal Correspondence.

Fierek, Hilve (1996). "By Fifth Bell, There Were No Nazis." Inquiry in
Social Studies: Curriculum, Research, and Instruction. The Journal of the
North Carolina Council for the Social Studies, pp. 10-12.

Goodlad, John (1984). A Place Called School: Prospects for the Future. New
York: McGraw Hill.

Holliday, Laurel (Ed.) (1995). "Yitskhok Rudashevski," pp.137-183. Children
in the Holocaust and World War II: Their Secret Diaries. New York: Pocket
Books.

Lewin, Rhoda G. (Ed.) (1990). Witnesses to the Holocaust: An Oral History.
Boston: Twayne Publishers.

Parsons, William S., and Totten, Samuel (1994). Guidelines for Teaching
About the Holocaust. Washington, D.C.: United States Holocaust Memorial
Museum.

Shelley, Lore (1991). Criminal Experiments on Human Beings in Auschwitz and
War Research Laboratories: Twenty Women Prisoners' Accounts. San Francisco:
Mellen Research University Press.

Wiesel, Elie (1969). Night. New York: Avon Books.

Wiesel, Elie (1990). "Trivializing Memory." In Elie Wiesel's From the
Kingdom of Memory: Reminiscences. New York: Schocken Books.

Weiss, Reska (1961). Journey Through Hell. London: Vallentine, Mitchell.

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NOTE: This article was originally published in the National Council for the
Social Studies' SOCIAL EDUCATION, April 2000, 64(3):165-171.

To contact the author, write to him at stotten@comp.uark.edu