Shattered Liberation

Shattered Liberation: Sexualized Violence Against Holocaust Survivors, 1943-1946 challenges the notion of joyous liberation of Holocaust survivors by the Red Army, which is often embedded in popular imagination and collective memory. This is one of the first volumes to shine light on the sexualized violence that some Holocaust survivors endured in the hands of the Soviet Army, partisans, rescuers, and army personnel in filtration camps during the liberation process. By focusing on testimonies and memoirs, this book discusses in detail a wide range of interactions, including sexual violence, rape, forced cohabitation, sex barter, aid, and romance. The book addresses methodological challenges of employing survivors' testimonies in an analysis of a traumatic history of liberation sexualized violence. It explores the strategies survivors employed while recounting these traumatic experiences, and examines how survivors' experiences of sexualized violence during liberation have been both included in and excluded from public memory. By challenging the popular notion of liberation as universally positive and instead focusing on the memories of Jewish survivors, Shattered Liberation uncovers a far more complicated, if not devastating, reality.

Acknowledgments, by Nina Paulovicova, Anna Cichopek-Gajraj, and Joanna Beata Michlic Introduction, by Nina Paulovicova PART I : METHODOLOGY 1 "And This Was Our Liberation": Rape of Jewish Holocaust Survivors, the Reevaluation of Liberation, and the Social Power of Rape, by Monika J. Flaschka 2 "Did That Happen to You?": Addressing Rape Perpetrated by Red Army Soldiers Against Jewish Women Holocaust Survivors in Shoah Foundation Trainings and Interviews, by Carli Snyder 3 "The Other Calamities": Sexual Violence During Liberation in the First-Ever Interviews With Female Holocaust Survivors from Slovakia, by Monika Vrzgulová 4 "I Heard a Russian Voice: They Promised Us Girls. There Are No Bloody Girls Here": Remembering Sexual(ized) Violence by Holocaust Survivors in Slovakia, by Nina Paulovicova 5 Why We Need a History of Prostitution in the Holocaust, by Anna Hájková PART II: HISTORY 6 Oral Histories of Sexual Violence in Hiding During the Holocaust in Poland: Memory, Agency, and Reconceptualizing the "Rescuer", by Miranda Brethour 7 "Even the Partisans Were Not Safe": Sexual Abuse of Jewish Minors by Partisans in Occupied Belarus, by Yuliya von Saal 8 Liberators, Partners, and Rapists: Jewish Women from Romania Encountering Red Army Soldiers Around the End of World War II, by Stefan Cristian Ionescu 9 Homegoing After the Holocaust: Jewish Women's Experiences of Soviet Filtration and Violence, by Daina Eglitis PART III : MEMORY 10 The Witness Vanishes: Jewish Women from Hungary Remember Sexual Violence During WWII, by Andrea Peto 11 The Red Army and the Multiple Facets of Sexualized Violence on Holocaust Survivors From Greece, by Katerina Králová and Janis Nalbadidacis 12 Testimony to Sexual Violence After Liberation in the Holocaust Memories of Sara/Hannah Rigler and Primo Levi, by Violeta Davoliute Conclusion, by Anna Cichopek-Gajraj and Joanna Beata Michlic Index About the Editors About the Contributors