Study Page - Humor, Despite it all

To the Study Page

Historical Backgroud

Introduction

Didactical

start>>

source: ??? credit: ??

Humor, DeSpite it All

Rationale

The Holocaust is no laughing matter. As a result, for many years, the topic of humor during the Shoah was avoided, if not actually taboo. However, not exploring one of the most important tools that human beings have always used in the face of ordeals is equal to denying a whole human aspect of the victims of the Holocaust. By reducing the behavior of the Jews to only certain traits and categories, we project on the people concerned a new identity which does not reflect them accurately. Rather, we accept or validate only certain elements thereby creating a diminished image of the past, albeit one that makes us more comfortable and is easier to hear. We are aware that introducing the subject of humor and the Holocaust to a class unfamiliar with the radical characteristics of the Shoah could distort the reality of the past. Therefore, if it is particularly important to discuss this form of spiritual resistance, it stands to reason that humor during the Holocaust needs to be introduced in a suitable manner.

Historical Background

The role of the educator, in this case, will be to accompany and direct the students in their exploration of the resource only after ensuring that they understand the severe context of the ghettos and the camps. Therefore, ancillary information about the Nazi occupation, the “Final Solution,” ghettos and camps has been included, in addition to the selected texts, in order to provide appropriate base knowledge. After verifying that the basic historical knowledge has been acquired by the students, they will explore different forms and functions of humor using the texts on the Study Page. Through the particular and individual experiences in the ghettos and camps, the students will uncover a universal side of human nature that was expressed during a radical event of inhumanity.

Functions of Humor

Types of Humor

Humor as a sensitive topic

Spiritual Resistance

There are four important concepts that should be addressed in the course of this study. While we will make suggestions for lesson formats, it is the purview of each educator to determine the optimum design for their class that will allow for a complete understanding of all related elements.

Using the documents offline (A3 format recommended): Download the study page Download the biographies

Jewish Resistance

The "Final Solution"

The Ghettos

The Nazi Camps

What is the Holocaust?

The Nazi Camps

The "Final Solution"

Jewish Resistance

Humor as a sensitive topic Even though humor is known as a psychological defense mechanism and a form of spiritual resilience, its connection to the Holocaust might still provoke some uncomfortable feelings amid the fear that the subject could be considered inappropriate. The Holocaust was a traumatic period for the Jewish nation and is considered one of the worst periods in Jewish history. It is also considered by many historians and philosophers as an unprecedented event of moral depravity, brutality, and criminality in human history. As a result, there is a tendency to move gingerly around the subject of the Holocaust and humor. Indeed, humor is sometimes reduced to a mere laughter mechanism and considered a light subject, less acceptable than the themes of love and music, and holds the potential to trivialize the Shoah. It is well known among survivors, but less known among the public, that humor was ever-present in Jewish culture and society before, during, and after the Holocaust.

Spiritual Resistance During the Second World War, as Nazi Germany invaded Europe, Jewish people who had lived throughout the continent for centuries were removed from their homes by German soldiers and their collaborators and deported to ghettos and camps. In the face of insurmountable circumstances, the Jewish victims were determined to protect whatever fragments of their dignity they could salvage. During this period, a new concept developed in the ghettos and camps called the “sanctification of life” or “uberleben” (“to outlive”). This meant that individuals would do everything possible to foil the Nazis’ attempt to eliminate the Jewish people. In an effort to preserve their identity as human beings, shades of family life, professional expertise and cultural traditions were sustained wherever and however possible. By doing so, by maintaining these vestiges, individuals were able to retain a modicum of dignity, and thereby their very existence.

The determination with which the Jewish victims clung to these practices and activities supports the tenet that physical survival carried a spiritual element as well. One needed to hold onto an additional goal or belief in order to draw the inner strength to survive. During the Holocaust there were many types of resistance. The use of weapons, partisan activity, and planned attacks on the Nazis was known as armed resistance. There were also many examples of unarmed, cultural, or spiritual resistance. The creation of schools in the ghettos, the writing of songs, preparation of musical activities, drawing, painting, keeping diaries, and maintaining religious customs all helped Jewish people grapple with the physical terror they were living with on a daily basis. This resistance of the soul was the underlying facet of every other effort to live another day.

Types of Humor Humor, like beauty, is a theoretical concept that exists only in our minds and not in a real world. The ability to create and understand humor is a cognitive trait that is based on the neurological foundation and can be expressed physically, through laughter or with a smile. The ability to grasp humor is instinctive, and rests on a genetic mechanism. From a non-academic perspective, we view humor as a “sense,” and thus, we talk about a “sense of humor.” Humor, therefore is not the stimulus in the external world, although there are stimuli that lead to humorous reactions. Humor is also not an emotion, although it can affect emotions and thus, is used in certain emotional situation. There are multiple types of humor including: Physical humor, in which the physical escapades of an individual elicit laughter. Self-deprecating, which induces laughs at one's own expense. Satire, which utilizes exaggeration, irony, sarcasm etc. and often serves as social commentary, inviting the viewer to contemplate familiar matters more deeply. Dark or black humor pokes fun at those topics usually off limits such as death, illness and other forms of pain and suffering. Wordplay includes puns, word mix-ups or double entendres.

The Intellectual Function of Humor

The Social Function of Humor

The Aggressive Function of Humor

Humor as a Defense Mechanism

Functions of Humor The many forms of humor can be employed in any number of situations and circumstances. What does humor provide in these moments?

Read more

I didn’t even know offhand which way I was supposed to turn, and all I remember is that in the thick of it I felt a bit like laughing, in part out of astonishment and confusion, a sense of having been dropped slap in the middle of some crazy play in which I was not entirely acquainted with my role"

Read more

Death stands before our eyes I feel his breath here quite near. And we, we laugh at him, At death, in his eye … The Jewish laughter Has within it so much torment, When weeping cannot help, One laughs as much as one can.

The Jewish Laughter

Read more

"Every day at the art café on Leszno Street one can hear songs and satires on the police, the ambulance service, the rickshaws, and even the Gestapo, in a veiled fashion. The typhus epidemic itself is the subject of jokes. It is laughter through tears, but it is laughter."

Read more

"The way in which a man accepts his fate and all the suffering it entails, the way in which he takes up his cross, gives him ample opportunity - even under the most difficult circumstances - to add a deeper meaning to his life. It may remain brave, dignified and unselfish. Or in the bitter fight for self-preservation he may forget his human dignity and become no more than an animal."

Read more

“We used to laugh a great deal over food. I clearly remember how we doubled up with laughter, how we laughed hysterically at all kinds of implausible phenomena. Not everyone, there were those who it was impossible to make laugh.”

Read more

“Don’t think that we laughed from morning to night. These episodes were like little havens that simply helped to overcome this whole terrible thing. Otherwise we wouldn’t have been able to hang on for even a week.”

Read more

It was around this time of day that the man called Rubinstein also used to make his way down Elektoralna Street, ragged and dishevelled, his clothes fluttering in all directions. He brandished a stick, he hopped and jumped, he hummed and murmured to himself. He was very popular in the ghetto. You could tell he was coming quite a long way off when you heard his inevitable cry of, 'Keep your pecker up, my boy!' His aim was to keep people's spirits up by making them laugh. His jokes and comic remarks went all around the ghetto, spreading cheerfulness.

Read more

Read more

I looked for people who were easygoing, more willing to share, more able to help one another. And really, we are still close friends today. Also, people with a sense of humour who were willing to laugh.

Read more

February 23, 1940: Nalewki Street looks like Hollywood nowadays – wherever you go you see a star!

Translated from Yiddish by Miriam Bulwar David-Hay

The Jewish laughter Has within it so much torment, When weeping cannot help, One laughs as much as one can. Even though the heart full of pain weeps, The face twisted and black, And we, we laugh As long as we are still fated to…

Death stands before our eyes I feel his breath here quite near. Generations, old generations Did not mention him so much, With every step there is danger here With every pace we are bound by the wires of Ponar! And we, we laugh at him, At death, in his eye …

The Jewish Laughter

When the slaughterer's knife lies at the throat Justice to the end it wins! So let us laugh as long As we are still fated to … So laugh then! Laugh then, brothers, As long as a limb can move… Stifle within yourself the pain, Even though it burns and scalds… May your laughter ring out far… It is to be hoped that a time will still come When you will laugh Out from the bottoms of your hearts!

Translated from Yiddish by Miriam Bulwar David-Hay

And now a new trick is invented: To Ostland they send us out. The power assures: It is for work; But still our fear is great, Fooled, already put upon enough, From suffering the pitcher is already full. So let us laugh as long As we are still fated to … It is known to the whole world, And the biggest enemies too, That troubles when we can endure; They fly through exactly like smoke …

"Every day at the art café on Leszno Street one can hear songs and satires on the police, the ambulance service, the rickshaws, and even the Gestapo, in a veiled fashion. The typhus epidemic itself is the subject of jokes. It is laughter through tears, but it is laughter. This is our only weapon in the ghetto – our people laugh at death and at Nazi decrees. Humor is the only thing Nazis cannot understand." "The Diary of Mary Berg: growing up in the Warsaw Ghetto", A One World Book, 2006, p. 104.

.01

The way in which a man accepts his fate and all the suffering it entails, the way in which he takes up his cross, gives him ample opportunity - even under the most difficult circumstances - to add a deeper meaning to his life. It may remain brave, dignified and unselfish. Or in the bitter fight for self-preservation he may forget his human dignity and become no more than an animal. Viktor E. Frankl, Man’s Search of Meaning, (Washington Square Press 1988), p.88

.02

Szpilman, Władysław (1998). The Pianist: The Extraordinary True Story of One Man's Survival in Warsaw, 1939–1945

It was around this time of day that the man called Rubinstein also used to make his way down Elektoralna Street, ragged and dishevelled, his clothes fluttering in all directions. He brandished a stick, he hopped and jumped, he hummed and murmured to himself. He was very popular in the ghetto. You could tell he was coming quite a long way off when you heard his inevitable cry of, 'Keep your pecker up, my boy!' His aim was to keep people's spirits up by making them laugh. His jokes and comic remarks went all around the ghetto, spreading cheerfulness.

.03

Return

Ghetto Fighters' House Museum, Israel/ Photo Archive

“A Fool or a Prophet: Jester”, Amos Goldberg, The 2019 J.B and Maurice Shapiro Annual Lecture at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, march 2019, page 18.

Rubenstein, a popular figure in the Warsaw ghetto in 1941-42, used humor and biting mockery as a way to express the anger and hatred Jews felt toward the Nazis and the ghetto police. Photo credit: Meczenstwo Walka, Zaglada Zydów Polsce 1939-1945. Poland. No. 98.

“Rubinstein’s Alle Glaych (everybody’s equal) thus encapsulated all these meanings that the people of the ghetto found in it - terrible social inequality, the erosion of individual identity, and life in face of death – and was for this reason, I contend, so popular and was called the philosopher of the ghetto. But at the same time these words were enunciated casually, humorously, in a total performance so unique in the ghetto landscape. And that’s why the residents of the ghetto were able to listen and to enjoy them. Indirectly and through the use of humour, Rubinstein allowed the harshest tensions and existential sentiments regarding life and death in the ghetto surface. That was his power.”

February 23, 1940: Nalewki Street looks like Hollywood nowadays – wherever you go you see a star! Mid-September 1941: A joke is making the rounds. Germany has waged a total war in Poland, a momental [“momentary”] war in France, a ratal [“installment”] war in England, and a fatal war in Russia. H.[itler] is trying to imitate Napoleon. He began the war with Russia on the 22nd of July, the same day Napoleon invaded Russia. But H. is already late, because Napoleon was in Moscow by the 14th or 15th of September. They say that at the beginning of his Russian campaign Napoleon put a red shirt, to hide the blood if he would be wounded. H. put on a pair of brown drawers.

.04

Emmanuel Ringelblum, Notes from the Warsaw Ghetto: The Journal of Emmanuel Ringelblum, (Publishers Group West – New York, 2006), p. 22 – p, 216 – p, 265

May 8, 1942: Churchill invited the Chassidic rabbi of Ger to come and see and advise him how to bring about Germany’s downfall. The rabbi gave the following reply: “There are two possible ways, one involving natural means, the other supernatural. The natural means would be a million angels with flaming swords were to descend on Germany and destroy it. The supernatural would be if a million Englishmen parachuted down on Germany and destroy it.”

.04

# 16760 Pavel Fantl (1903-1945) Metamorphosis, Theresienstadt Ghetto, 1944 Watercolor, pencil and India ink on paper 22.8x29.7 cm Collection of the Yad Vashem Art Museum, Jerusalem Gift of Ida Fantlová, the artist's mother, courtesy of Ze'ev and Alisa Shek, Caesarea Photo © Yad Vashem Art Museum, Jerusalem

.05

Chaya Ostrower, It Kept Us Alive: Humor in the Holocaust, Yad Vashem, 2014, p. 85

“Don’t think that we laughed from morning to night. These episodes were like little havens that simply helped to overcome this whole terrible thing. Otherwise we wouldn’t have been able to hang on for even a week.”

.06

Chaya Ostrower, It Kept Us Alive: Humor in the Holocaust, Yad Vashem, 2014, p. 118

“We used to laugh a great deal over food. I clearly remember how we doubled up with laughter, how we laughed hysterically at all kinds of implausible phenomena. Not everyone, there were those who it was impossible to make laugh.”

.07

Chaya Ostrower, It Kept Us Alive: Humor in the Holocaust, Yad Vashem, 2014, p. 156

“[...] I looked for people who were easygoing, more willing to share, more able to help one another. And really, we are still close friends today. Also, people with a sense of humor who were willing to laugh. [...] Either she understood or she didn't understand. Sometimes she would laugh half an hour later and we'd say, "Finally, you figured it out. Tomorrow we'll tell you one more joke and you'll have a week to digest it." [. . .] I looked for other people who also didn’t take things with the harsh reality of: We're here now and we’re going to die.”

.08

"I didn’t even know offhand which way I was supposed to turn, and all I remember is that in the thick of it I felt a bit like laughing, in part out of astonishment and confusion, a sense of having been dropped slap in the middle of some crazy play in which I was not entirely acquainted with my role" […] "Around me too were all manner of happy noises of slopping, sneezing, and blowing: a cheerful, carefree moment. With the other boys, we teased one another plenty over our bald heads. It turned out that the soap did not, sad to say, lather much but contained a lot of sharp, gritty specks that grazed the skin." […]

.09

Imre Kertész, “Fatelessness", Vintage International Press, 2004, p.57– p. 97 – p. 142-143.

“Do you know what this here,” pointing to his chest, “this letter ‘U,’ signifies?” Sure I did, I told him: “Ungar, Hungarian.” No,” he answered, “Unschuldig,” meaning “innocent,” then gave a snort of laughter followed by prolonged nodding of the head with a brooding expression, as if the notion were somehow highly gratifying, though I have no idea why. Subsequently, and quite often in the beginning, I saw the same on others in the camp from whom I also heard that wisecrack, as if they derived some warming, fortifying emotion from it" […]

.09

Translation:

Christmas of “Ak” Transport Member in Terezin1941 A.D.1942 A.D.1943 A.D. And God Forbid 1944 A.D.