Book chapter
Women Carers
Stealth Altruism
2017
Abstract
According to Professor Rochelle Saidel, "There is much evidence of women's kindness to one another". Many female medical personnel were able to save lives "by hiding, exchanging the files of the dead for those of the living, and performing clandestine abortions to save mothers from the gas chamber". Supportive relationships—substitute mothers, "camp sisters", friends, and same-sex lovers—were essential to the survival of many female slave laborers. Carers, knowing "life is made through belonging, through deepening connections", encouraged and helped maintain such relationships as long as possible. Camp sisters practiced a wide range of nurturing activities. Many female teachers and professors taught informal forbidden classes on a wide variety of subjects, albeit without texts and other common classroom aids. The male-dominated world of Holocaust scholarship and memorialization has long erred in generalizing men's experiences to women, thereby sidelining women.
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Details
- Title
- Women Carers
- Creators
- Arthur B. Shostak
- Publication Details
- Stealth Altruism
- Publisher
- Routledge
- Edition
- 1
- Resource Type
- Book chapter
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Sociology; Culture and Communication [Historical]
- Other Identifier
- 991020705349704721