Creating a youth ambassador: a critical study of a Swedish project on teaching and learning about the Holocaust

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on a project within the government-supported Swedish Committee Against Antisemitism program. To our knowledge, this is the first study to employ full-project interviews and participant observations to explore Swedish study trips to Holocaust memorial sites. It applies the educational concepts of qualification, socialization, and person-formation inspired by educational theorist Gert Biesta. Students acquired qualified concepts regarding the Holocaust's ‘what' and ‘why’ dimensions. However, findings indicate that attention should be paid to how external organizers risk narrowing the potentials of education about the Holocaust due to a lack of preexisting relations among students, and between educators and students.

KEYWORDS:

• Holocaust education
• teaching and learning about the Holocaust
• study trips
• qualification, socialization, person-formation
• teaching and learning

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Flennegård, Besöksmål Auschwitz, 24–5.

2 Ibid., 7.

3 Regeringskansliet, 2014.

4 Interview with “Eva,” educator.

5 Ibid.

6 Regeringskansliet, “Medel till Svenska kommittén mot Antisemitism,” author’s translation.

7 Regeringskansliet, “Ansökan från Svenska kommittén mot antisemitism;” Interview with “Eva,” educator.

8 Regeringskansliet, “Ansökan från Svenska kommittén mot antisemitism.”

9 Davies and Rubinstein-Avila, “Holocaust Education,” 156–8. The term teaching and learning about the Holocaust (TLH) will henceforth be used instead of the established term Holocaust education, because it is “refocusing attention to pedagogy.” Pearce, “Challenges, Issues and Controversies,” 7.

10 Riksdagen, “Anslag för skolresor till Auschwitz.”

11 Österberg, “Visits and Study Trips to Holocaust-Related Memorial Sites and Museums.”

12 Flennegård and Mattsson, “Teaching at Holocaust Memorial Sites.”

13 Flennegård and Mattsson, “Democratic Pilgrimage.”

14 Österberg, “Visits and Study Trips to Holocaust-Related Memorial Sites and Museums,” 247.

15 Eckmann and Stevick, “General Conclusions,” 287.

16 Bromley and Russell, “The Holocaust as History and Human Rights,” 168.

17 Carrier and Messinger, The International Status of Education About the Holocaust, 13–14.

18 Skolverket, Grundskolan. Kursplaner och betygskriterier, 77.

19 Foster et al., What Do Students Know; Pettigrew et al., Teaching About the Holocaust.

20 Lange, A Survey of Teachers’ Experiences and Perceptions, 95.

21 Wibaeus, “Att undervisa om det ofattbara,” 250.

22 Flennegård and Mattsson, “Teaching at Holocaust memorial sites,” 55.

23 Flennegård and Mattsson, “Democratic Pilgrimage,” 14.

24 Harding, “Nationalising Culture,” 359–60.

25 Feldman, Above the Death Pits, Beneath the Flag, 58.

26 Ben-Peretz and Shachar, “The Role of Experiential Learning in Holocaust Education,” 19–21.

27 Österberg, “Visits and Study Trips to Holocaust-Related Memorial Sites and Museums,” 260–1.

28 Feldman, Above the Death Pits, Beneath the Flag, 255.

29 Ibid., 77–92.

30 Fanjoy, “Learning in the ‘Land of Ashes’.”

31 Ibid., 238.

32 Ibid., 147–53.

33 Alba, “‘Here There Is No Why’ – So Why Do We Come Here?” 134.

34 Kverndokk, “Pilegrim, turist og elev,” 165–7.

35 Ibid., 265.

36 Kverndokk, “Resan till ondskan,” 79, author’s translation; emphasis in original.

37 Cowan and Maitles, “We Saw Inhumanity Close Up,” 180–1.

38 Ibid., 172, 181.

39 Ibid., 164.

40 Hammersley and Atkinson, Ethnography: Principles in Practice, 93.

41 Pettigrew, “Why Teach or Learn About the Holocaust?”

42 Ibid., 269.

43 Ibid., 282.

44 Van Poeck and Östman, “Sustainable Development Teaching.”

45 Biesta, Good Education in an Age of Measurement.

46 Van Poeck and Östman, “Sustainable Development Teaching,” 60.

47 Ibid., 61.

48 Ibid., 61.

49 Ibid., 62–5.

50 Ibid., 62.

51 Håkansson, Östman and Van Poeck, “The Political Tendency in Environmental and Sustainability,” 103.

52 Ibid., 104.

53 Ibid.

54 Braun and Clarke, “Reflecting on Reflexive Thematic Analysis,” 594.

55 Braun and Clarke, “Using Thematic Analysis in Psychology,” 83–4; “Reflecting on Reflexive Thematic Analysis,” 592.

56 Danermark, Ekström and Karlsson, Att förklara samhället, 131–3.

57 Braun and Clarke, “Using Thematic Analysis in Psychology,” 84–5.

58 Extract from interview with “Eva,” educator.

59 Extract from interview with “Ellen,” student.

60 Extract from field interview with “Inez,” student.

61 Ibid.

62 The Yad Vashem Encyclopedia of the Ghettos During the Holocaust, entry: Rabka, 627–8.

63 Extract from interview with “Erik,” educator.

64 Extract from field interview with “Wiktor,” student.

65 Extract from field interview with “Ludvig,” student.

66 Extract from field interview with “Ellen,” student.

67 Extract from field interview with “Engla,” student.

68 Extract from field interview with “Mira,” student.

69 Interview with “Eva,” educator.

70 Extract from interview with “Valter,” student.

71 Extract from interview with “Erik,” educator, emphasis added.

72 Browning, Ordinary Men, 72–4.

73 Extract from interview with “Valter,” student.

74 Extract from interview with “Julia,” student.

75 Extract from interview with “Anton,” student.

76 Extract from interview with “Erik,” educator.

77 Extract from field interview with “Marta,” school staff.

78 Extract from interview “Eva,” educator, emphasis added.

79 Extract from interview with “Daniella,” school staff.

80 Interview with “Hans,” school staff.

81 Extract from written answer by “Meja,” student.

82 Extract from written answer by “Anton,” student.

83 Extract from written answer by “Tove,” student.

84 Extract from field notes, SCAA-slide.

85 Extract from interview with “Erik,” educator.

86 Extracts from interview with “Rune,” school staff, emphasis added.

87 Interviews with “Hans”; “Elvira,” school staff.

88 Extract from interview with “Ellen,” student.

89 Extract from field interviews with “Ingrid”; “Engla,” students.

90 Extract from interview with “Julia,” student.

91 Extract from interview with “Valter,” student, emphasise added.

92 Extract from written answer by “Ludvig,” student.

93 Extract from field interview with “Julia,” “Ellen,” “Tove,” students.

94 Flennegård and Mattsson, “Democratic Pilgrimage,” 14; Flennegård and Mattsson, “Teaching at Holocaust Memorial Sites,” 55; Wibaeus, “Att undervisa om det ofattbara,” 250.

95 Biesta, Good Education in An Age of Measurement, 19–23.

Additional information

Funding

The author received financial support from Stiftelsen Natur och Kultur under grant number [802000-3813] for the research, and authorship for this manuscript.

Notes on contributors

Ola Flennegård

Ola Flennegård, author of the first report (2018), and of the first scientific studies (2021) on Swedish study trips to Holocaust memorial sites. Currently a PhD-student and teacher at the Segerstedt Institute, Gothenburg University (https://www.gu.se/en/segerstedt-Institute/about-us/staff).