On this subject Philippe Raxhon unequivocally denounces the accusation regularly levelled at the Israeli state of instrumentalising the Shoah for its own political benefit. ‘The existence of a monstrous tension, in the main sense of the word, between on the one hand extraordinary historical work of great quality, remarkable steps forward in terms of museology and pedagogy, considerable institutional endeavours on an international scale [...]; and on the other, in contrast, a denial of various sources, media and ideological corruptions, caricatural trivialisations or anachronistic comparisons.’

The Liège historian also dwells on what he calls the ‘globalisation of memory’ over colonial pasts and slavery. All in all the site of memory of the domination of humankind by humankind is becoming the entire planet, every era included. A phenomenon which is both disturbing and alarming, he writes, without forgetting to point out that certain historians have themselves contributed to it ‘in toppling the bronze statues of the heroes of national positivism.’ The distortion between history and memory is becoming a tear, with the abandonment of the contexts and singularities of historical situations. And there is a major risk at issue: the simplifying visions of the past, so characteristic of totalitarian ideologies.

Not without having warned against the proliferation of memorial legal acts ‘which direct our model of society towards the managing of affairs by judges and not by elected representatives,’ Philippe Raxhon in the end advocates replacing the word memory by that of heritage, a ‘less heavily charged’ concept. And rediscovering in passing the path which leads to the richness and complexity of the past, in particular in the relationship between nations, human beings, social classes and societies. All in all a way to stimulate a sharing of memories...

Opening up history

Sophie Ernst (Associate Professor at the French Institute of Education) invites us to reflect on another important aspect: school. Focusing on what she terms ‘negative commemorations,’ in other words those which ‘bring nothing but pain, the awareness of irreparable tragedies,’ she suggests different pathways for reintegrating the transmission of memories into the school environment. She in effect thinks that the young should not find themselves crushed under the weight of traumatic and anxiety triggering pasts – which are sometimes the roots of conflicts which teachers find hard to manage – but instead be in a dynamic of hope and an interest in cultural otherness. In short anything but martyrology.

It would maybe be better, she suggests for example, to have children discover the marvellous Yiddish culture and klezmer music, to have them discover Gypsy culture rather than take them to Auschwitz, and that would be a form of commemoration equal to another. The Yiddish culture has been assassinated, but what survives of it deserves to be passed on; gypsy forms of music are immensely seductive and remind the world of the precarious existence of a people whose very existence is still threatened. In the same way it is worth remembering that we owe to slavery the music which has revolutionised our tastes and conquered the world...

Bearing witness as a researcher to the investment of numerous professors in inventive projects, Sophie Ernst reminds us that memory takes over history in a subjective manner and that it is this ‘subjectification, this concentration on a subject of affects, desires, wishes, etc. which makes it of value for pupils.’ That is very different to a presentation of the 1914-1918 War such as we were used to having forty years ago: the causes of the war, the political events, the battles, descriptions of the front, and the consequences of the peace treaties. We needed films of fiction, theatre plays, sometimes the rediscovery of forgotten books, before we could grasp an essential aspect: what the soldiers in the trenches experienced, what happened to a whole generation of very young men. It was by moving into subjectivity and individual stories that we were able to discover a much more consistent objectivity which the ‘seen from above’ description had obliterated.