Virtual Holocaust Memory: from Testimony to Holography

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This Fellowship investigates the ways that digital culture and the passing of time are shaping a new era of Holocaust remembrance in the West. Broadly focussing on what the Holocaust means for those with no strong personal links to the genocide, the book that will result from this Fellowship coins the term 'virtual Holocaust memory' to describe forms of cultural and educational encounter that are highly experiential, digitally-mediated, and linked to powerful utopian narratives about personal development and political resolution (such as the refrain 'never again'). As digital artworks, museums, memorials and archives proliferate, consuming the Holocaust has become easier than ever before; yet I will question the degree to which the virtual memories engendered within emergent digital societies can underpin significant social change, not least because the rise of virtual Holocaust memory coincides with a period of deepening global economic inequality and political unrest. While recognising the importance of digital culture for the transmission of Holocaust memory, in the book Virtual Holocaust Memory I will argue that Western cultural and educational practice must meaningfully reengage with the traumatic experiences and sense of extremity that made reading, writing and viewing so difficult for survivors and their contemporaries in the immediate post-war period. As well as surveying current digital trends, I will therefore explore non-digital spaces and modes of representation such as literature, poetry and camp sites to ask how their complex representational strategies might inform the digital artworks, archives and institutions of the future. Ultimately, I will argue that virtual Holocaust memory must engage the sense of responsibility towards the past that any personal or collective 'memory', in the strictest sense of the word, might properly be expected to entail.As well as exploring the changing nature of Holocaust memory on theoretical and critical levels, this Fellowship will involve close collaboration with groups who are actively involved in keeping those memories alive. I will run a two week events programme at the newly-opening Johannesburg Holocaust and Genocide Centre supported by two postgraduate or early career researchers. Using video conferencing technology we will facilitate a range of transnational and transgenerational interactions between survivors, their families, professionals, volunteers, academics and members of the public at three further partner organisations: the University of Southern California Shoah Foundation, the National Holocaust Centre (UK) and the Holocaust Survivors Friendship Association (UK). These events will consider how digital technology is shaping Holocaust memory in different global contexts and participants will reflect on how their experiences, skills and expertise might contribute to the future development and use of such technologies.My research will appeal to a wide community of scholars working in Holocaust studies, memory studies, genocide studies and connected disciplines, also prompting debate and discussion amongst teachers, creative practitioners, students, museum professionals and members of the public. I will develop a suite of digital materials for a project website, including professionally-filmed interviews, video essays, vlogs and podcasts, in which Holocaust survivors, researchers and educators will reflect on current issues relating to Holocaust memory and its mediation in digital societies. I will also convene a seminar series for scholars at the Universities of Leeds, Sheffield and York under the title 'Memory, Trauma and Violence', providing an intellectually rigorous forum within which a new generation of researchers will be able to present work-in-progress and engage with world-leading academics on a regular basis.