(I meant to post this during Women's History Month. Clearly, I'm a bit late. Anyway. )
I love the Woman and the Holocaust: A Cyberspace of Their Own site. This is what woman's history is: academic scholarship, personal testimonies, poetry, literature and art. It is the multiplicity of representation that allow us to find the history of women which is elided, ignored and erased from mainstream history. The experience of women Holocaust survivors has demonstrated this over and over again; notably in the work of Lawrence Langer who claimed that women's experiences weren't substantially different to men. This fails to consider the very real biological differences between men and women which did result in their experiences being gendered. After all, although a few men were also victims, sexualised violence was predominantly an experience of women and children; as was caring for children, elderly and disabled family members.
The dedication of Women and the Holocaust: A Cyberspace of Their Own reads:
Who were murdered while pregnant. Holding little hands of children or carrying infants in their arms on the way to be gassed. In hiding. To the mothers who gave their children to be hidden, many never to find them again. To the righteous gentile mothers and the nuns in convents, who were hiding and protecting the children in their care.
Or as fighters in the resistance: in ghettos, forests, partisan units.
And to the lives of those few who survived and bravely carried on.This site is an amazing resource and one which I highly recommend.
