"Someone Else's History": Preservice Teachers Addressing and Avoiding Antisemitism When Teaching a Holocaust Survivor's Testimony

• In Event: Thursday Roundtable Session 4:20 pm
  In Roundtable Session: Exploring Neglected Narratives and Racial Literacies: Social Studies Teachers' Beliefs and Practices (Table 21)

Abstract

Despite the potential for Holocaust education and survivors’ testimonies to decrease antisemitism, teachers are often unprepared to teach about the Holocaust, confront antisemitism in their classes, or teach students to confront antisemitism. I present a case study of how three preservice social studies teachers (PSTs) plan and teach a lesson about a Holocaust survivor’s testimony in Night (Wiesel, 2006) and their explanations of how antisemitism impacts their instruction. These cases illuminate how PSTs teach a testimony without specific training or preparation, providing teacher educators insight into PSTs’ needs for opportunities to learn and practice teaching testimonies from traumatic histories.

Authors

• Anna Yonas, University of Kansas

• Stephanie D. van Hover, University of Virginia