Oral History and the Holocaust in Slovakia Selective and Contradictory Memories

Nearly thirty years ago, Monika Vrzgulová took part in the very first oral history research project aimed at Holocaust survivors in Slovakia. That project transformed her professional as well as her personal life. The Holocaust as a scholarly subject and the oral history method have stayed with her to this day. This book summarizes her findings and the experience she has acquired researching Holocaust memory, combining memory studies, oral history, autoethnography, and reflexive writing methods. It presents data from two international research projects which took part in Slovakia too and are available to experts and the public online. The insights gained from this research are contextualised with the social situation in a country that is trying to come to terms with its past after the fall of Communism.

1. Introduction: A Brief History of the Holocaust in Slovakia.- 2. The Holocaust in Slovakia and Modes of Remembering: Communicative and Cultural Memory Since the Second World War to the Present.- 3. The Oral History Method and Holocaust Research in Slovakia: An Insider’s Reflections.- 4. The Images of the Non-Jewish Majority in Survivors’ Holocaust Memories.- 5. Jewish Neighbours in the Memories of Non-Jewish Eyewitnesses.- 6. Conclusion.

Monika Vrzgulová is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Ethnology and Social Anthropology of the Slovak Academy of Sciences. In cooperation with non-governmental organizations, she applies the results of her research in education programs for Slovak secondary school students and teachers. From 2005-2017 she led the Holocaust Documentation Center in Bratislava.