Integrated Media
Using
Salvaged Pages
Carrie A. Olson
USHMM Teacher Fellow
“These writings
capture the experience
of young people from
the inside—not as the
Nazis decreed it, not as
observers witnessed it,
not as historians made
sense of it after events
occurred.” (Zapruder)
They wrote with
no knowledge of
the outcome.
They observed and recorded:
• What they ate and how they dealt with hunger
• How they communicated.
• How they dealt with loss of home and family.
• How they continued to hope for a better future.
Alexandra
Zapruder
Voices on Antisemitism
USHMM Podcast
Series
Hope & Despair
Anonymous Boy:
Lodz Ghetto
• June 11, 1944, p. 371
• July 15, 1944, p. 383
Compassion & Empathy Despair as Part of
Suffering
Anonymous Girl: Lodz Ghetto
• March 5, 1942, p. 234
Hope for Individual Survival Hope for the
World
Elsa Binder: Stanislawow, Poland
• January 30, 1942, p. 319
“These diaries remind
us that even in the
face of annihilation it
can be a worthy act of
defiance to write down
your story and
proclaim to the world,
‘I exist…
I’m still here’”
-Lauren Lazin
director and Academy Award Nominee,
Tupac: Resurrection
What are your immediate thoughts?
Which images or diary passages stand out for
you?
What qualities set those diarists apart?
What is new information you learned?
What surprised you?
What evoked a strong feeling?
What questions did the film raise?
What do you want to know more about?
How did the voice of these young people add
to your understanding of the Holocaust?
Zapruder saw how the
writers shifted between
varying perspectives, voices,
and scopes of interest.
Dawid Rubinowicz
She developed one organizing principle
to untangle the shifting nature of the
diarists’ writing by considering the
different perspective or “worlds.
Eva and Petr Ginz
Zapruder identified these ‘worlds’ as:
1) The internal world with the voice
of reflecting;
2) The immediate world with the
voice of reporting;
3) The external world with the voice
of chronicling.
Dawid Rubinowicz
The “world” is a model for students to
engage in the process of literary analysis.
Students will to learn that the diarists
wrote for many different reasons, in many
different styles and under very different
circumstances.
Elisabeth Kaufman
REPRODUCIBLE 13
Internal Perspective/Reflecting
• Most personal of these
• Reflecting voice
• Self-examination, their inner lives,
their deepest thoughts and feelings.
• Matters of character, dreams, hopes
• Relationships and conflicts with
family, friends, etc
• Faith, religion, and belief (or lack of
belief) in God.
Moshe Flinker
REPRODUCIBLE 14
Immediate World/Reporting
• One step removed from the internal
one
• Daily lives or important events that
occur within the writer’s personal
• Reporting tone, often devoid of
emotion or personal reflection
• Great detail, with an emphasis on
accuracy and specificity.
Peter Feigel
REPRODUCIBLE 15
External World/Chronicling
• More removed from the personal
life
• Chronicle a series of events as it
happened to their community, or
capture a
• Most literary forms of expression;
• Chroniclers capture in writing
scenes and incidents
• See and sketch these moments for
their generality
Yitskhok Rudashevkski
How does each “world” inform you
about the Holocaust?
What factors impact how the diarists
express themselves?
As you read this excerpts, keep in mind
the factors that shape your own “world”
and voice.
How could you use this
in your classroom?