- The Presence of the Absence
Die Lebendigkeit der Geschichte.
International conference for eyewitnesses and descendants of "both sides"
Internationale Konferenz für Ueberlebende und Nachkommen von Opfern und Taetern des Nationalsozialismus. Vienna University, 1-3 September 1999
Organized by
ARCHE - Plattform für Interkulturelle Projekte, Wien
Institut für vergleichende Geschichtswissenschaften, Berlin
Second Generation Trust, London
Verein zur Erforschung nationalsozialistischer Gewaltverbrechen und ihrer Aufarbeitung, Wien
Kunst und (Punkt). Verein zur Foerderung kultureller Kommunikation, Wien
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ARCHE
Senefeldergasse 39/28
A-1100 Wien
Austria
Tel. 0043/1/606 72 16
Fax. 0043/1/603 91 75
Email arche@arche.or.at
URL http://www.arche.or.at/arche/conf
Second Generation Trust
PO Box 2863
GB-London NW3 5BQ
United Kingdom
Tel. 0044/171/431 2610
Fax. 0044/171/431 0210
Email secgentrust@compuserve.com
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Miriam Rieck, Haifa Impressions from the conference "The presence of the absence" in Vienna
- The conference The presence of the absence, organized by the Second Generation Trust at the University of Vienna was defined as an International conference for eyewitnesses and descendants of "both sides". It hosted representatives of survivors and their descendants, and from the perpetrators´ side - mainly "second generation" Germans and Austrians. It included plenary sessions, workshops and open forum meetings - providing the participants with an opportunity to discuss the subject from historical, social and psychological points of view, including their expressions in art, literature and music.
Since many parallel sessions took place, this report is necessarily subjective, based on the writer´s interests and possible biases.
The Austrians posed for a long time as "victims" who were "liberated" in 1945. Wanting to correct this distorted view of history, the Austrian participants stressed the importance of having this conference in Austria. Regarding Austria as a victim leads to denial and repression of the Nazi past. At the same time the importance of uncovering the past was stressed by young Germans, and the complex German-Jewish relations were put forward. Phylo-Semitism may be anti-Semitism in disguise. "Both sides" try to learn about their roots, to preserve the memory of the atrocities of this dark era, and to understand its consequences.
With regard to survivors, Jews and Roma and Sinti spoke for themselves, some speaking of permanent health damage due to persecution, others emphasizing their coping capabilities, and the importance of defining their group. The culture of trauma has accentuated exclusively its negative aspects and parallels between inner and outer neuroses were drawn. Esra, an organization for helping Jewish Holocaust survivors and Holocaust survivors´ offspring presented their activities. They have gained much experience in treating the long-lasting adverse effects of severe trauma, and suggested to include in their interventions members of the Roma and Sinti, who are also Holocaust survivors.
Representatives of the Sinti and Roma brought the stories of their sufferings during the Holocaust, their acquired permanent health damage, the discrimination they experience even today, as well as loss of property, all of which started only recently to be recognized. When claiming reparations for health-damage due to persecution, they experience the same injustice and humiliation the Jews underwent decades ago. Even today they continue to be exposed to stereotyped approach. Their representatives try to get back property, to receive reparations and not last - to establish a social frame for their members.
The similarity of the problems encountered by Jews and by the Sinti and Roma in connection with reparations are striking, yet the latter started only belatedly to come forward with their justified claims, and are probably not enough recognized and supported.
One other important subject examined the continuity or discontinuity in medicine before and after 1945. The doctors till and after 1945 were the same doctors, and the so-called euthanasia has not entirely stopped after 1945. The biologistic medicine and the strict authoritarian and blind discipline in hospitals did not disappear. The Nazis did not invent the hygiene of the race. Financial considerations are ever present. During the Holocaust all horrors were self-evident. Can the past return? Medication may be as violent as other interventions, and hospitals are as authoritarian as they had been between 1939 and 1945.
Gottfried Wagner, Richard Wagner´s great-grandson examined the "Entartete Musik" as protest against National Socialism, and reflected on musical identity after 1945 in relation to the Nazi past. The Nazi regime identified atonality with Judaism, from what they wanted to free the music. In the sixties new documents were discovered, among them those of Jews trying to whitewash Wagner.
Though the sessions of open forums were intended to provide an opportunity for informal meetings and reflections, this was not always the case. They often served for lectures not included in the workshops. Also, the lack of a chairperson sometimes interfered with the planned presentations and insufficiency of simultaneous translation necessitated improvisations and sometimes loss of chosen workshops, since the promised language was not presented.
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Short biographical note Miriam Rieck, Ph.D., has been a research fellow at the Ray D. Wolfe Centre for Study of Psychological Stress, the University of Haifa, since 1979. The main focus of her work is Holocaust studies. In 1997 Dr. Rieck was involved in the establishment of an archive for Holocaust survivors’ audio-video testimonies, in collaboration with the Yale University´s Archive. Between her latest publications is "The psychological state of Holocaust survivors offspring: an epidemiological and psychodiagnostic study". The International Journal of Behavioral Development, 17, 1994, 649-667; and forthcoming "The later medical and psychological effects of the Holocaust on its survivors and their offspring. An annotated bibliography". Hamburg 2000.
Miriam Rieck, Ph.D.
The Ray D. Wolfe Centre for Study of Psychological Stress
University of Haifa, Mount Carmel
IL-Haifa 31905, Israel
Tel. 00972/4/824 01 80
Fax. 00972/4/825 44 70
Email rieck@psy.haifa.ac.il
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Citation Miriam Rieck, Haifa, Impressions from the conference "The presence of the absence" in Vienna. International conference for eyewitnesses and descendants of "both sides". Vienna University, 1-3 September, 1999. In: Trauma Research Newsletter 1, Hamburg Institute for Social Research, July 2000.
URL http://www.TraumaResearch.net/net1/confrep1/riec.htm
Copyright © 2000, Miriam Rieck and trauma newsletter, all rights reserved. This work may be copied for non-profit educational use if proper credit is given to the author and the trauma newsletter. For other permission questions, please contact via email the editor Cornelia_Berens@his-online.de
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