Deaf People and the Holocaust
Cover image: "Doris Fedrid and Rose Steinberg Feld" by Nancy Rourke. This painting is part of the Deaf Survivors of the Holocaust series . This painting is the second and third part of the series. (Used with permission; c lick here to view the full painting on Nancy Rourke's website. )
Purpose
There are as many as 308,000 Deaf/Hard of Hearing children between 5-17 in the U.S. ( United States Census 2018 ), but research is unavailable regarding what Holocaust-related content is being taught in their classrooms. This Story Map aims to provide a central location for educators to access resources about the Holocaust's impact on Deaf people specifically.
Problem
"We need to learn more about the disappearance of deaf Jews and deaf Gypsies. We need to know more about what difference in treatment occurred between genetically deaf and late deafened people by people who were oral vs. people who signed. We need to know more about deaf people in other countries. And we need to know more about how deaf people coped and survived." - Peter Black, Senior Historian at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (1998)
Speech lessons by palpation of the larynx in the Israelite Deaf-Mute Institution Berlin-Weissensee, Berlin, 1934. Photograph by Herbert Sonnenfeld. Jewish Museum Berlin, Inv.-No. FOT 88/500/1/002, purchased with funds provided by Stiftung DKLB (Source: Jewish Deaf Community Center)
Recommended Reading
Surviving in Silence: A Deaf Boy in the Holocaust, The Harry I. Dunai Story
By: Eleanor C. Dunai, Harry I. Duna, and John S. Schuchman (2017) Gallaudet University Press
Izrael Zachariah Deutsch was born deaf to a Jewish family in 1934. Shortly after enrolling in a Jewish school for deaf children in 1940, the Nazi regime "destroyed Izrael's world forever." He narrowly escaped death countless times, only to learn after his liberation that his parents and two brothers were murdered by the Nazis. His other siblings spread out all over the world. He finished his studies, became a machinist, and through a vast network of friends, family, and survivors, traveled to Sweden, and ultimately settled in Los Angeles, CA, and changed his name to Harry Dunai.
Crying Hands: Eugenics and Deaf People in Nazi Germany
By: Horst Biesold and Henry Friedlander (2004) Gallaudet University Press
Excerpt from introduction–
"Horst Biesold’s Crying Hands treats a neglected aspect of the Holocaust: the fate of the deaf in Nazi Germany. His book covers a story that has remained almost unknown. In the United States, even in Germany, few are aware that during the Nazi era human beings—men, women, and children—with impaired hearing were sterilized against their will, and even fewer know that many of the deaf were also murdered."
Disability in Twentieth-Century German Culture
By: Carole Poore (2010) University of Michigan Press
Disability in Twentieth-Century German Culture explains how foundational "the notion of disability is to modern German cultural history." Through reviewing several visual and literary representations of disability, Carol Poore dissects the "contradictions of a nation renowned for its social services programs yet notorious for its history of compulsory sterilization and eugenic dogma." It includes the "horrors of the Nazi era, when those with disabilities were considered 'unworthy of life,'" and the evolution of Germany's disability rights movement.
Deaf People in Hitler's Europe
Edited by: Donna F. Ryan and John S. Schuchman (2002)
Deaf People in Hitler's Europe is a collection of stories from its namesake conference in 1998. Henry Friedlander analyzes the attack and oppression of deaf people and people with disabilities in the Nazi's attempt to create an Aryan race. The compilation also covers the topics of deaf sterilization, eugenics theory, through essays by Robert Proctor, Jochen Muhs, Kurt Lietz, and John S. Schuchman.
The Origins of Nazi Genocide: From Euthanasia to the Final Solution
By: Henry Friedlander The University of North Carolina Press (2000)
The Origins of Nazi Genocide describes how the Nazis secretly eliminated people with disabilities through its "euthanasia of the handicapped" program, ultimately leading to the genocide of Jews and Gypsies. This book also unpacks the role of the German legal and government systems at that time, and the involvement of scientists and doctors in the mass sterilization efforts.
Websites and Publications
Media
Deaf Art from the Holocaust
The Deaf Holocaust - Deaf People and Nazi Germany
Deaf Holocaust Survivor: Lily Rattner Shirey: Exodus
Worry
Classroom Applications
- Encourage students to select a book to read about Deaf people and the Holocaust and create a Pecha Kucha presentation about it.
- Invite students to watch Melmira's interview of a Deaf Holocaust survivor's children and write a one-page reflection about their main takeaways.
- Watch a Deaf survivor testimonial video and engage in a class discussion about the experiences they shared.
- Ask students to select a piece of artwork related to Deaf people and the Holocaust and host an educational gallery event (e.g., "Wax Museum" concept) where attendees can ask students about its history.
- Encourage students to create an ASL video about a Deaf Holocaust survivor and their life achievements.
