projects
psychotherapists in relation to concentration camps
The tragic experience of concentration camps still poses important questions. There are many attitudes that a person can assume in relation to such questions. We may be deaf to these questions or pretend that we didn't hear them, we may negate the sense of posing such questions, we may remain in front of them or even try to approach them and face up to them. The purpose of the project was to attempt to reflect on what questions contemporary psychotherapists ask themselves in the context of keeping alive the memory of concentration camps and how they try to answer them. Probably the most renowned psychotherapist who addressed this issue directly was Victor Frankl, whereas in Poland it was Antoni Kępiński - the pioneer of Polish psychiatry.
Analysis of the fundamental premises of social constructionism and narrative concepts is particularly important in the perspective of the concentration camp experience. Does the concentration camp tragedy de facto reveal the limitations of these concepts and does it not contradict them? Are stories about concentration camps still present in our lives or perhaps we do not feel the need to remember these stories? Who finds it important to re-tell these stories? What can we learn from these stories? Are these stories indirectly present in our therapeutical work? How do these stories resonate in us as psychotherapists?
Concentratation camps have become a tragic sign of the Holocaust. Many Jews people were murdered in death and concentration camps but there were also a great many non-Jews who were exterminated in this way. Please do not forget about their voices! Please remember about Gypsies, Russians, Polish, homosexuals, Jehova's Witnesses and many, many others!
When I refer to concentration camps, I am not only thinking about Nazi Concentration Camps as, for example, the most infamous concentration camp Auschwitz-Birkenau. There were also concentration camps in the Soviet Union which were called Gulags. The beginnings of the concentration camp history reach much further back than World War II - concentration camps were first enforced in 19th century in Cuba by the Spanish administration. During Boers War, the British harnessed concentration camps to herd the entire Boer population together where they couldn't hide or supply guerrillas. Unfortunately, there are also contemporary examples of concentration camps... Former Yugoslavia in 1990s, North Korea, Myanmar (Burma), etc...
Now, I would like to invite you to pose different questions and attempt to look for answers. This is an ongoing project and my hope is that your contributions can enrich this project. Please email any questions, comments and reflections you may have: . This website is continually being developed.