Bearing Witness to Natality: The Politics of Birth at Auschwitz

Abstract

Abstract The accounts of Stanisława Leszczyńska and Gisella Perl, a midwife and gynecologist at Auschwitz respectively, reveal their acts of resistance to the Nazi regime. Using Hannah Arendt’s conception of natality—which finds in birth the origins of political action—to interpret Leszczyńska’s and Perl’s accounts, I find natality present at birth in a plurality of ways that demand recognition and respect. Where political institutions do not respect natality, the interpersonal act of bearing witness to natality can offer a profound political critique. Leszczyńska’s and Perl’s accounts show the intense pressure of external forces on the responsibility to affirm the natality of others, but I argue that bearing witness to natality is meaningful, regardless of whether or not it upends an oppressive political regime. Hope in dark times is best embodied in acts that bear witness to the natality of others, acts that are themselves a form of political natality, and not in the abstract and passive hope for a better world.