The Americanization of the Holocaust - Show What Essays

"The Americanization of the Holocaust" - Show What Really Happened Flanzbaum, Hilene. "The Americanization of the Holocaust." Journal of Genocide Research 1, no. 1 (1999): 91-104. Accessed May 18, 2016. "The Americanization of the Holocaust" was written by Hilene Flanzbaum. The article was written about how America has slowly manipulated the majority view of what really happened during the Holocaust, and goes into deep detail about the subject. In my opinion, Flanzbaum did a good job on showing and explaining how information about the Holocaust has been Americanized. She also does a good job of showing the importance of the problem, which is that we need to properly remember the Holocaust in the way that it really happened and we need to start working fast, as the last survivors of the Holocaust are aging quickly. If we do not do this, it is very disrespectful to the millions of people that died in the Holocaust, and to Jewish people as a whole. The purpose of her article was to inform readers about how information about Holocaust has been falsely represented, and warped by American culture. Flanzbaum has three degrees total, a B.A. from Brandeis University, a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania, and an M.A. in poetry from Johns Hopkins University. She currently works as a professor at Butler University in Indiana, where she specializes in twentieth century American literature, especially poetry, and also works in ethnic studies and Holocaust literature. Hilene is the Director of Creative Writing at Butler University, and has been a fellow at the US Holocaust Museum and Memorial. "About Butler," Butler University, accessed May 20, 2016, http://legacy.butler.edu/about/directory/?a=viewprofileu=hflanzba . Based on this information, it can be said that Flanzbaum is very well informed on the topic of the Holocaust, on the topic of literature in general, and can be seen as a credible source of information. The main point of Flanzbaum's article seemed to be that most of our information about the holocaust has slowly become more and more warped, and falsified. One of our biggest sources of information on the Holocaust, and one that a very large number of people have read, "The Diary of Anne Frank", has been changed and edited to the point where it seems more like a nice story about hope, instead of a story of a nightmarish, horrible time for jewish people. Many other writings about the holocaust have been written based on Anne Frank's story, creating a sort of "whisper down the lane" effect, where every representation of the Holocaust is completely different from the original Anne Frank's diary that was published. This is an especially important problem, because the first version of Anne Frank's diary published in the United States was heavily edited in the first place. A subpoint that Hilene included within this is that there have been many plays and other theatre productions th at are based on things, that are based on things, that are based on Anne Frank's Diary, contributing to the manipulation of how people see the Holocaust through more popular forms of entertainment. Hilene supports her main point well, using solid evidence to show how information and writings about the holocaust have changed over time. In the second page of her article she writes "The very text of the Diary, originally edited for sexually suggestive and what was considered by Anne's father overly personal material, has been only gradually returned to its original form. In 1986, 1989 and 1991 altered or restored versions appeared. In 1994, the "definitive" edition was finally published (that is, until someone offers an even more definitive edition)." This statement shows that even Anne Frank's Diary itself has only been returned to its almost original form fairly recently. The definitive edition of "The Diary of a Young Girl" claims to introduce thirty percent more of the original writings from Anne Frank's actual diary than previous versions, but does not exclusively say that it is the same as the original. "The Diary of a Young Girl : The Definitive Edition." Amazon.com. Accessed May 21, 2016. https://www.amazon.com/Diary- Young-Girl-Definitive-ebook/dp/B005MHI0QM Hilene also goes into detail about different manipulations of the holocaust in theatre format. As a support, she gives an example of a situation