Indiana University Press

When She Remembered - Ashley Valanzola

When She Remembered showcases an intertwined group of seven influential women, from well-known figures such as Simone Veil to memory activist Sabine Zlatin, who shaped the production of Holocaust memory in France from 1945 to the present. Most of these women began their memory work immediately after the war by testifying at perpetrator trials and when monuments were commissioned. In the subsequent decades, their work transformed from personal memory projects to large-scale, politically driven initiatives. Through decades of engagement with Holocaust memory, these seven individuals ensured the stories of Jewish women were featured in the greater wartime narrative. In doing so, they deliberately shifted the French discourse on the Holocaust away from a focus on victimization and resistance to female agency during the fight for survival under Nazi occupation. Alongside other activists, these women became political actors by pushing the state to reckon with the legacy of French complicity in the deportation of Jews. Pulling from diverse archival sources as well as material culture and oral histories, When She Remembered convincingly reveals why the themes of gender, resistance, and memory continue to resonate widely in French history.

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