Sharing the Same Space: How the Memory of the Holocaust Travels in Political Speech

Abstract

ABSTRACT In this research I examine how collective memory travels in political speech. I qualitatively analyze how the memory of the Holocaust is deployed in non-commemorative settings across three national contexts: Israel, Germany, and the US. Findings demonstrate how the memory of the Holocaust is selectively presented and rearranged to support a domestic agenda. Ever-expanding transnationalization has thus heightened interconnectivity, enabling the memory of the Holocaust to travel over and beyond traditional settings. It has also admitted memories from beyond the border into the national context of public sense-making through speech. Discussing implications for theory and scholarship, I argue that the social construction of memories as transnationalized entities, and their importation via political speech holds within it a socially-charged question, namely, to whom does this memory belong?