“A journey everyone should take” Sites of Holocaust memory and the question of dark tourist transformation

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“A journey everyone should

take”

1 Sites of Holocaust memory and the question

of dark tourist transformation

Danny Tatlow

11107723

Master’s thesis in Holocaust and Genocide Studies

University of Amsterdam 6th July 2016

Supervisor: Prof. dr Nanci Adler (NIOD)

Second Reader: Dr Karel Berkhoff (NIOD)

University of Amsterdam

Graduate School of Humanities

Holocaust and Genocide Studies

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Acknowledgments

In work as in society, no one individual can truly achieve without the support, hard work

and assistance of others around them. As such, the construction, research and writing of this

thesis would not have been possible without the aid and exertion of a number of people,

and because of that I wish to briefly share some words of thanks.

Firstly I wish to express my deepest thanks to my professors from this academic year,

especially my supervisor Prof. dr Nanci Adler, whose supportive comments, helpful notes

and hard work provided some invaluable insights and knowledge that improved my thesis

dramatically. I’d also like to thank Dr Kjell Anderson, Dr Karel Berkhoff, Prof. dr Johannes

Houwink ten Cate and Thijs Bouwknegtfor their support and guidance throughout the past

year. To be taught by academics who are each so passionate and knowledgeable about

different aspects of the Holocaust and genocide has enabled me to become a better writer,

student, researcher and individual. I’d also like to thank the above names for their

persistence and effort in reading and marking my sometimes incomprehensible handwriting.

Without the aid and assistance of a number of institutions, my evidence for researching this

thesis would have been very thin on the ground. Therefore I’d like to thank the Anne Frank

Huis for allowing me to peruse their visitor books stored in their archives. Their staff were

extremely accommodating and very useful in helping me to find what I was looking for. I’d

also like to acknowledge the hard work and assistance of the staff at the NIOD and the

organisation itself. The NIOD reading room has a vast amount of helpful literature and was a

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got to know well during my internship, in particular Barbara Boender, Janneke Francissen

and Prof. dr Kees Ribbens. As well as their invaluable support and supervision during the

internship, each was always very interested in what my thesis was about and how I was

progressing and this interest helped spur me to continue.

Lastly I’d like to thank my friends, family and fellow students. I feel extremely lucky to have

had so many friendly, humorous and interesting classmates, who were incredibly passionate

about our subject and always more than happy to go for a well needed beer (or few) after

covering a particularly taxing topic. I’m so glad I had the chance to meet each and every one

of them. I especially thank my closest friends, Philip de Tombe, Rick Hoefslot, Sydney

Budgeon, Hannah Hunter, Pablo Campana, Bart Nauta, Nicole Toedtli and Katja Grosse

Sommer for all their constant hospitality, support and faith in me. Thanks to James Lynch,

Vlad Serbenescu, Lorenzo Angelini and Victoria Cole for making life in Voorburgstraat a

whole lot more bearable. Without them and everyone else that I have had the pleasure to

meet, my time in Amsterdam would not have been anywhere near as fun, interesting or

eventful, and for that I am forever grateful.

Finally, I have to give thanks to my parents, Teresa and Robert and my sister Kate. I thank

them for their constant and unwavering support in whatever I choose to do. I thank them for

always being there for me and assisting and helping me however and whenever they can. I

thank them for their pride, their love and their belief in me. I would not be half the person I

am today without having been raised by them and for that they have my everlasting love

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Introduction

“It’s awesome! I loved it, it really changed me when I saw it! It was great and a life changing experience”2

Chapter Overview

This chapter will provide an introduction to the term dark tourism, and introduce the

research ideas that are going to be investigated throughout this thesis. A brief historiography

of the literature on dark tourism, tourist motivation and selfies/photography will also be

included. The research methodology to be employed will likewise be covered.

Introduction: Transformation at sites of Holocaust memory?

A common perception has emerged in contemporary culture that the Holocaust transcends

ordinary historical experience and possesses a revelatory power. “Auschwitz cannot be

explained, nor can it be visualised…..the Holocaust transcends history.”3_{In many respects}

this has come bundled up as part of a moral obligation, that of “never again.” As such

witnessing and sightseeing at sites of Holocaust memory have become to a certain extent, a

mandatory ethical travel itinerary – “something everyone should do before they die,” and a

“harrowing visit, but needs to be done” or “a must see.”4_{Can it be possible from a solely}

touristic perspective to truly understand or experience the Holocaust? As Elie Wiesel argues

“The truth of the Holocaust remains hidden in its ashes. Only those who lived it in their flesh

2 Anne Frank House, Guest Book. March 2016.

3 Elie Wiesel in Peter Novik, The Holocaust in American Life, (New York : Houghton Miffin , 1999), 211.

4 Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum (Oswiecim, Poland): Hours, Address, Tickets & Tours, Attraction Reviews," September 7, 2015, accessed December 7, 2015, http://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g274754-d275831-Reviews-or10-

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Auschwitz_Birkenau_State_Museum-and in their minds can possibly transform their experience into knowledge. Others despite

their best intention can never do so.”5_{Yet despite this, millions of tourists every year visit}

sites of Holocaust memory, and a key question is why. Why has witnessing the Holocaust

become a moral obligation, and what do tourists get out of visiting sites of death and

destruction, beyond a vague sense of voyeurism? A highly prevalent idea that has emerged

is the possibility of self-transformation6_{, gaining either knowledge or a sense of physical or}

personal change. This notion is both evident in marketing, “Few who come here will be

unchanged by the experience.”7_{And by tourists themselves “You could not say this was}

enjoyable it was far too harrowing but it was a very thought provoking visit and I felt change

by having been here.”8_{Thus this thesis seeks to discover what is meant by the possibility of a}

tourist transformation at sites of Holocaust memory, whether such an attempt to gain

transformation changes tourist behaviour or their attempts to remember and whether a site

that is so imbued with atrocity is actually able to be utilised by tourists in a transformative

way.

This transformative idea is perfectly encapsulated in what Carol Zemiel calls “the Holocaust

sublime,” an “act of witness intended to transport us to the brink of human existence, to a

space between life and death...edging us into barely imagined terrors.”9_{It is this act of}

witness then that many dark tourists seek to find, to some extent a way to experience the

“essence” of a historical past that they themselves never lived through. The placing of the

5 Ellie Wiesel, quoted in Jennifer Hansen-Glucklich, Holocaust Memory Reframed: Museums and the Challenges of

Representation (United States: Rutgers University Press, 2014). 134

6 Steven Cooke and Donna-Lee Frieze, “Imagination, Performance and Affect: A Critical Pedagogy of the Holocaust?,” Holocaust Studies21, no. 3 (2015). 158-159

7 Jonathan Bousfield et al., The Rough Guide to Poland 6 (rough Guide Travel Guides), 6th ed. (New York: Rough Guides, 2005). 21

8 Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum (Oswiecim, Poland): Hours, Address, Tickets & Tours, Attraction Reviews," September 7, 2015, accessed December 7, 2015, http://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g274754-d275831-Reviews-or10-Auschwitz_Birkenau_State_Museum-Oswiecim_Lesser_Poland_Province_Southern_Pola.html#REVIEWS.

9 Carol Zemiel, quoted in Paul Antick, Itourist? Journeys through the Holocaust, 2015, accessed December 7, 2015,

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Holocaust as a special event that is not part of any traditional historical narratives, makes its

memory especially attractive to be exploited by minorities and others and as such brings

with it questions about who has ownership of Holocaust memories and who gets to mourn.

Another key question is who gets to remember? Should tourist have to behave a certain way

at sites of Holocaust memory, or should they be allowed access to such memorial sites at

all? This thesis seeks to both utilise existing literature but also to grow it in some respects,

placing a lot of emphasis on the very recent and understudied phenomenon of Holocaust

selfies, as a key way in which tourists try to witness and subsequently transform both

themselves at sites of Holocaust memory and their idea of the memory site itself.

Dark Tourism

The study of dark tourism is still reasonably new, having only become the source of

academic research in the mid-1990s when Lennon and Foley coined the term, described as

“the phenomenon which encompasses the presentation and consumption (by visitors) of

real and commodified death and disaster sites.”10_{However, as much of the literature notes,}

the idea of tourist visiting a site of death and destruction is in no way a symptom of the 20th

and 21st_{century alone: nobility watched the battle of Waterloo from afar, while as early as}

the 11th_{or 12}th_{century, travellers visited the Holy Lands to attempt to view the site of}

Christ’s crucifixion.11_{As we shall see later in the thesis, the notion of the pilgrimage and the}

sacred is intertwined with travel towards death and the contemporary practice of dark

tourism.12_{Lennon argues that the first institutionalised dark tourist sites came about during}

10 Malcolm Foley and John Lennon, "JFK and Dark Tourism: A Fascination with Assassination," International Journal of

Heritage Studies 2, no. 4 (December 1996): 198–211, doi:10.1080/13527259608722175. 198

11 Jeffrey S. Podoshen, “Dark Tourism Motivations: Simulation, Emotional Contagion and Topographic Comparison,” Tourism Management 35 (April 2013), doi:10.1016/j.tourman.2012.08.002.

12 Noga Collins-Kreiner, “Dark Tourism As/is Pilgrimage,” Current Issues in Tourism September 3, 2015, doi:10.1080/13683500.2015.1078299.

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the American civil war, with Manassas being sold as a tourist attraction the day after the

battle.13_{Many terms have come to describe this notion of dark tourism, like Rojecks “black}

spots”, as “sites in which celebrities or large numbers of people have met sudden or violent

death,”14_{or Seaton’s thanotourism, “travel to a location wholly, or partially motivated with}

desire for actual or symbolic encounters with death.”15_{Bloom’s idea of “morbid tourism”,}

“tourism that contains significant elements of what might be labelled deviant, dubious,

macabre and even frightening and is often linked with death and destruction.”16_However,

there is still a lack of consensus as to the overarching definition of the term dark tourism,

and as Stone and Sharpley note the term continues to remain poorly conceptualised, and

theoretically fragile.17_{Current academic work on dark tourism is focused around three}

different approaches. Lennon and Foley as well as Stone and Shapley’swork revolves around

a supply perspective which focuses on a descriptive approach,18_{emphasising the presence of}

the individual in sites of death and destruction.19_{However, as Biran et al note, such an}

approach leads to a simplified understanding of dark tourism by ignoring the diversity of the

individual’s experience of motives for visiting such a site.20_{Secondly, there is a demand-}

orientated perspective which is defined in terms of the tourist motivation for the visit to

such sites – dark tourism as “travel to a location wholly or partly motivated by the desire for

13 John Lennon, "Journeys into Understanding," The Guardian (The Guardian), October 2, 2006,

http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2005/oct/23/darktourism.observerescapesection.

14 Chris Rojek, Ways of Escape: Modern Transformations in Leisure and Travel, 3rd ed. (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 1993). 136

15 A.V. Seaton, "War and Thanatourism: Waterloo 1815–1914," Annals of Tourism Research 26, no. 1 (January 1999): 130– 158, doi:10.1016/s0160-7383(98)00057-7. 131

16 Thomas Blom, “Morbid Tourism - a Postmodern Market Niche with an Example from Althorp,” Norsk Geografisk

Tidsskrift - Norwegian Journal of Geography 54, no. 1 (May 24, 2000), doi:10.1080/002919500423564. 29

17 Cited in Neil Robinson, Dark Tourism Motivations: An Investigation into the motivations of visitors to sites associated

with dark tourism, (Salford, Manchester: University of Salford, 2015), http://usir.salford.ac.uk/36776/5/dark %20tourism.pdf. 29

18 John Lennon and A.V Seaton, “Thanatourism in the Early 21st Century: Moral Panics, Ulterior Motives and Alterior Desires.,” in New horizons in tourism: Strange experiences and stranger practices, ed. T. V. Singh (Cambridge, MA: CABI Publishing, 2004).

19 Avital Biran, Yaniv Poria, and Gila Oren, “Sought Experiences at (Dark) Heritage Sites,” Annals of Tourism Research 38, no. 3 (July 2011), doi:10.1016/j.annals.2010.12.001. 821

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actual or symbolic encounters with death.”21_{Like the above mentioned supply perspective}

however, this approach still revolves around the assumption that dark tourist motivations

are primarily concerned with death, rather than anything else.22_{Finally, an integrated}

supply-demand perspective, that questions the need to consider both supply and demand as

dark tourism factors.23_{This represents a move from a descriptive to a more experiential}

approach, which suggests that tourists who visit dark sites may engage in experiences that

can be clarified as non-dark, for example visiting a site to gain an educational experience,24

to enjoy the aesthetic beauty of the space,25_{or maybe even to become a better person.}26

More recent research has divided dark tourist sites into primary or secondary. Phillip Stone

suggests that not all sites are dark in the same way, rather that there exists a typology or

spectrum of dark tourism, graded as either darker or lighter depending on the character of

the dark tourism site in question. Original sites of death, like the Holocaust death camps

occupying the darkest shade of dark tourism and sites associated with death and destruction

such as Museums occupying lighter shades.27_{Although as yet still reasonably unaccepted by}

contemporary tourism scholarship, the term dark tourism has come under criticism because

as Bowman points out, the very act of defining a touristic activity as dark is also

controversial, lending itself to an implicit claim that either the site or the tourists themselves

have something abnormal, morbid or perverse about them.28

21 A.V Seaton, “Guided by the Dark: From Thanatopsis to Thanatourism,” International Journal of Heritage Studies 2, no. 4 (December 1996), doi:10.1080/13527259608722178. 240

22 Avital Biran, Yaniv Poria, and Gila Oren, “Sought Experiences at (Dark) Heritage Sites,” Annals of Tourism Research 38, no. 3 (July 2011), doi:10.1016/j.annals.2010.12.001. 822-823

23 Ibid, 823

24 Nathan K. Austin, “Managing Heritage Attractions: Marketing Challenges at Sensitive Historical Sites,” International

Journal of Tourism Research 4, no. 6 (2002), doi:10.1002/jtr.403.

25 Yaniv Poria, Richard Butler, and David Airey, “The Meaning of Heritage Sites for Tourists: The case of Masada,” Tourism

Analysis 9, no. 1 (January 1, 2004), doi:10.3727/1083542041437549.

26 Steven Cooke and Donna-Lee Frieze, “Imagination, Performance and Affect: A Critical Pedagogy of the Holocaust?,” Holocaust Studies21, no. 3 (2015).158

27 Richard Sharpley and Philip R. Stone, eds., The Darker Side of Travel: The Theory and Practice of Dark Tourism (Bristol Channel View Publications, 2009). 18

28 Michael S. Bowman and Phaedra C. Pezzullo, “What’s so ‘dark’ about ‘dark tourism’? Death, Tours, and Performance,” Tourist Studies 9, no. 3 (December 2009), accessed July 4, 2016, doi:10.1177/1468797610382699,

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Dark Tourist Motivation

Much like the notion of dark tourism itself, tourist motivations for visiting sites of death and

destruction are as of yet not wholly understood, partly due to the under-research of the

field.29_{While it has been noted that motivations are complex and subjective, varying from}

one individual to another and being linked to their own individual notion of the given dark

tourism site.30_{Some scholars have suggested some broad reasons and trends for the}

motivations of dark tourism. Seaton and Lennon revolve their motivations primarily around

death, identifying schadenfreude (gaining pleasure in view another’s pain or misfortune) and

thanotophis (the contemplation of death) as being two of the main push factors that lead

tourists to visit dark sites. At the heart of the majority of proposed motivations is a question

about the visitors own mortality, and the perceived want for some of an experience they

cannot have in the everyday: a tangible encounter with death “for one to pass over and

experience the afterlife and return, must itself be the ultimate in travel, and with the

absence of the authentic/here and now, a visit to a dark site, with all its manifestations of

previous dark activates, arguably comes a close second to experiencing the afterlife.”31

Ashworth postulates a number of differing motives for visitors such as satisfying curiosity of

the unusual, empathetic identification, pilgrimage, a search for identity and a sense of social

responsibility, to being entertained by the suffering of others.32_{In more recent years, a want}

for an educational experience and the gaining of heritage or historical related knowledge has

http://tou.sagepub.com/content/9/3/187.short?rss=1&ssource=mfr. 190-191

29 Neil Robinson, Dark Tourism Motivations: An Investigation into the motivations of visitors to sites associated with dark

tourism, (Salford, Manchester: University of Salford, 2015), http://usir.salford.ac.uk/36776/5/dark%20tourism.pdf. 28 30 John Lennon and AV Seaton, “Thanatourism in the Early 21st Century: Moral Panics, Ulterior Motives and Alterior Desires.,” in New horizons in tourism: Strange experiences and stranger practices, ed. T. V. Singh (Cambridge, MA: CABI Publishing, 2004).

31 C. Dale and N. Robinson, “Dark Tourism,” in Research themes for tourism and leisure, ed. P. Robinson (Oxford: CABI, 2011). 207

32 G. J. Ashworth, “Holocaust Tourism: The Experience of Kraków-Kazimierz,” International Research in Geographical and

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been a clearly identified motive. Rogerson and Visser have noted how the tours of Soweto

townships provide a base for contemporary South Africans to understand the recent

apartheid past and potentially help promote transitional justice.33_{Peoria et al, suggest that}

so far academic research on tourist motivation for visiting dark tourism sites has overlooked

the subjectivity and knowledge of the individual tourist, preferring to portray tourists as

homogenous groups and passive receptors who need to be educated34_.

While the motivations for tourists to dark sites may be under-researched, the notion of

gaining self-change through travel or transformative travel has become an increasing

popular academic topic in the sphere of tourism. Much has been made of the potentiality of

transformation through travel, and academic research has tended to focus on niche parts of

youth or “rite of passage” tourism with key works by Nash, Noy and Hall investigating the

potential for transformation from overseas study, backpacking and “gap year” travel

respectively. Much work has also been done on the journeys of pilgrims and survivors

revisiting sites of Holocaust memory in an attempt to revisit as spiritual or sacred memorial

space. Kugelmass argues that Holocaust pilgrims, specifically American Jewish ones, seek to

make “past time present”, transposing themselves from a present experience to a past one35_.

He notes that American Jewish groups fear for the continued strength of Jewish group

solidarity in the modern world, and as such trips to Auschwitz and other sites of Holocaust

memory enable certain visitors to return to a time of their forefathers. “A journey to a much

simpler past.36_”

33 Christian M. Rogerson and Gustav Visser, “Rethinking South African Urban Tourism Research,” Tourism Review

International 15, no. 1 (January 1, 2011), doi:10.3727/154427211x13139345020336.

34 Avital Biran, Yaniv Poria, and Gila Oren, “SOUGHT EXPERIENCES AT (DARK) HERITAGE SITES,” Annals of Tourism

Research 38, no. 3 (July 2011), doi:10.1016/j.annals.2010.12.001. 824

35 Jack Kugelmass, 'Why We Go to Poland: Holocaust Tourism as Secular Ritual' in (ed.) James E. Young The Art of Memory:

Holocaust Memorials in History (The Jewish Museum, New York, 1994), 179

36 Jack Kugelmass, 'Why We Go to Poland: Holocaust Tourism as Secular Ritual' in (ed.) James E. Young The Art of Memory:

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Photographs and Selfies

The use of photographs, both in questioning the use of atrocity photographs as part of the

representation of the Holocaust and as part of a tourist self-gaze or fulfilment has also been

well covered in the literature, with Urry’s “Tourist Gaze”37_{and Susan Sontag’s “On}

Photography”38_{held up as seminal examples. As is to be expected with such a recent}

phenomenon, at this current moment in time the focus in the academic literature on selfies

has currently been rather light. This is not the case in popular media, as many newspaper

articles and opinion pieces have been written about the ethical dimensions of the Holocaust

selfie and its inherent trainees and narcissism.39_{In general though any academic interest has}

so far been mostly confined to the Art History, Anthropology or Media and Communication

spheres, with a large focus on the use and question of the physical being and the

metaphysical self, as seen through selfie taking, as Bent Fausing notes “They are used as a

reflection of an image of ourselves in which our external face meets or internal

consciousness.”40_{Selfies, self-taken photography with the photographer in the picture, have}

also been seen through the lens as part of a greater photographical tradition, as a “new

form” of digital tourist photography that “represents an intimate and personalised

medialization of the tourism experience,”41_{and even as an educational tool.}42_{However in the}

vast majority of literature there has been no more than a fleeting mention of the dark

tourism selfie or the Holocaust selfie. Magdalena Holdalska is one of the few authors that

37 Jonas Larsen and John Urry, The Tourist Gaze 3.0 (United Kingdom: SAGE Publications, 2011). 38 Susan Sontag, On Photography, 1st ed. (United States: St Martin’s Press, 2001).

39 "Should Auschwitz Be a Site for Selfies?," Culture Desk, June 26, 2014, accessed December 4, 2015, http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/should-auschwitz-be-a-site-for-selfies.

40 Bent Fausing, “Key Note : Become An Image. On Sefies, Visuality and The Visual Turn in Social Medias,” in Digital Visuality (Rome, 2013). 2

41 J Larsen, "Practices and Flows of Digital Photography: An Ethnographic Framework," Mobilities 3, no. 1 (2008): 141–160.

42 Stacey Margarita Johnson et al., "The Selfie as a Pedagogical Tool in a College Classroom," College Teaching 62, no. 4 (October 2014): 119–120, doi:10.1080/87567555.2014.933168.

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does investigate these images, positing that Holocaust selfies are part of a greater

narcissistic desire for the individual to become part of a larger narrative.43

Research Question

This thesis will seek to investigate, how exactly a narrative of transformation influences

tourist’s experiences at sites of Holocaust memory.

This will include research into tourist behaviours at such sites, questioning whether the idea

of transformation impacts tourist behaviour at sites of Holocaust memory. And asking if

there is a correct way to visit sites of Holocaust memory. As well as this, it will query

whether the idea of transformation affects specifically how tourists remember and how an

overarching transformative or self-change ideal is promoted and marketed by tourists,

commercial businesses and the sites of memorial themselves.

Methodology

This thesis is primarily focused on two very different sites of Holocaust memory. Auschwitz

Birkenau in Oświęcim, Poland, and the Anne Frank Huis in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Auschwitz Birkenau has been described as the epitome of dark tourism44_{, and as such has}

already been very well explored in the dark tourism literature, however there is a key reason

43 Magdalena Hodalska, Smiling Holocaust Selfies: Dark Tourism and Digital Narcissism, September 24, 2015, accessed December 4, 2015, doi:http//dx..org/10.13140/RG.2.1.2134.0647,

http://www.researchgate.net/publication/282133888_Smiling_Holocaust_Selfies_Dark_Tourism_and_Digital_Narcissism. 44 William F. S. Miles, “Auschwitz: Museum Interpretation and Darker Tourism,” Annals of Tourism Research 29, no. 4 (October 2002), doi:10.1016/s0160-7383(02)00054-3. 1176

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for its inclusion here, - out of all the death camps, it is the most well know and hence the

most visited by tourists (1.5 million visited in 2014).45_{As well as this it has the most surviving}

original camp architecture, which is part of the “authentic” draw for visitors and the site

along with the Memorial to the Murdered Jews in Berlin has been the centre of the

Holocaust selfies phenomenon. According to Phillip Stone’s typology of dark tourist sites,

Auschwitz-Birkenau also exists as an example of a darkest site.46_{Like Auschwitz-Birkenau,}

the Anne Frank House is also very well visited by tourists, one of the most popular tourist

attractions in Amsterdam it draws over 1 million tourist annually and because of this it

provides a great example of the tourist site of Holocaust memory. Practical considerations

also informed my choosing of the Anne Frank House. As a local attraction, it has been easily

accessible for observation and research. On Phillip Stones typology of dark tourism sites, it

also occupies a much lighter position. The timescale the thesis will cover is between 1990

and 2016, following the screening of Spielberg’s Schindler’s list in the early 1990s there has

been increasing influx of visitors to sites of Holocaust memory, specifically Auschwitz-

Birkenau.47_{As Alan Muntz notes, the screening of “Schindlers List” can be seen as a}

watershed moment in popular representation of the Holocaust, being only comparable to

the screening of the TV miniseries “Holocaust” in 1987. 48_{Both representations were seen by}

a record number of viewers (25 million Americans at the cinema and 65 million when the

series was first shown on TV),49_{and with “Schindlers List” became “for the present}

generation the most important source of historical information affecting popular perception

45 Record 1.5 Million Visitors to Auschwitz in 2014, 70 Percent under 18 (VIDEO)," accessed December 7, 2015,

http://www.algemeiner.com/2015/01/04/record-1-5-million-visitors-to-auschwitz-in-2014-70-percent-under-18-video/# . 46 Philip R Stone, Death, Dying and Dark Tourism in Contemporary Society: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis, (Preston: University of Central Lancashire, 2010), http://clok.uclan.ac.uk/1870/1/StonePPhD_thesis_final.pdf. 82

47 Tim Cole, Selling the Holocaust: From Auschwitz to Schindler: How History Is Bought, Packaged, and Sold (New York: Routledge, 2000). 75

48 Alan L. Mintz, Popular Culture and the Shaping of Holocaust Memory in America (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2001). 127-128

49 Tim Cole, Selling the Holocaust: From Auschwitz to Schindler: How History Is Bought, Packaged, and Sold (New York: Routledge, 2000). 74

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of the Holocaust.”50_{Subsequently, tourist attention became focused on both the synagogues}

and Jewish cemeteries of the district of Kazimierz in Krakow where it had been filmed and

the nearby site of Auschwitz-Birkenau.51

Although this thesis will mention and question the idea of pilgrims and those with a

first-hand knowledge visiting the camps, the main focus is on people we could call “ordinary

tourists.” The main bulk of this thesis will be built around a comprehensive analysis of

secondary monographs and journal articles. However it will also include Anne Frank Huis in

order to observe the behaviour of tourists at said site, and in order to analyse the site’s

visitor books. The primary sources that I will utilise are primarily visual (photographs),

recent tourist guidebooks, Anne Frank Huis visitor books and contemporary internet based

media, including review and organisational websites such as TripAdvisor and image based

sharing platform like Instagram, the Tumblr “Selfies in Serious Places” and the photo sharing

website Flickr.

TripAdvisor is an online review and forum site, revolving around eWOM (electronic word of

mouth communication), where consumers and tourists can rate their overall holiday

experience, as well as individual components like restaurants, hotels and trips.52_{Started in}

2000, it currently has 280 million users, making it the largest such site on the web which

means that the influence of such consumer based reviews is potentially powerful and far

reaching.53_{Search terms including “authenticity”, “transformation”, “change” and}

“atmosphere”, among others, were focused on in reviews of Auschwitz-Birkenau and the

50 Frank Manchel, “A Reel Witness: Steven Spielberg’s Representation of the Holocaust in Schindler’s List,” The Journal of

Modern History67, no. 1 (January 1995), doi:10.1086/245018. 84

51 G. J. Ashworth, “Holocaust Tourism: The Experience of Kraków-Kazimierz,” International Research in Geographical and

Environmental Education 11, no. 4 (December 2002), doi:10.1080/10382040208667504. 365

52 Stephen J Page, Tourism Management, Fourth Edition: An Introduction, 4th ed. (Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann, 2014). 264

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Anne Frank Huis. Although as Camilla Vasquez notes, negative views are much more likely to

be paid attention to by tourists than positive reviews.54_{This thesis utilises both positive and}

negative reviews in order to see whether a perceived self-change was possible in the mind of

the tourist, or if something had prohibited such a transformation. Although extremely useful

in illustrating tourists’ expectations and feelings after a trip, a site such as TripAdvisor does

pose some problems for the academic researcher, concerning the credibility or validity of

the information. The online nature of a site makes it easy for users’ digital identities to be

changed, making such sites easy targets for online manipulation and abuse.55_{Moreover, the}

lack of visual or physical cues that assist in the correct interpretation of opinions are lacking,

making it difficult to clarify whether reviewers are telling the truth.56

This thesis has also made use of visitor books from the Anne Frank Huis. The research

utilised eight visitor books, from the years 2000 to 2013 and identified comments that

mentioned self-change, transformation, positive museum education or the

atmosphere/ambience on site, be that positive or negative. Although infrequently studied in

academia,57_{visitor books, due to their accessibility, allow the researcher to draw comments}

from a wider range of visitors than are typically seen in dedicated visitor research, and they

enable us to access “visitors meaning making.”58_{Much like sites like TripAdvisor, the}

academic use of visitor books also brings with it some limitations. McDonald notes that the

main drawback of using the type of material is the lack of background information available

54 Camilla Vasquez, “Narrativity and Involvement in Online Consumer Reviews: The Case of TripAdvisor,” Narrative

Inquiry 22, no. 1 (2012), doi:10.1075/ni.22.1.07vas. 108

55 “J. K. Ayeh, N. Au, and R. Law, “‘Do we believe in TripAdvisor?’ Examining Credibility Perceptions and Online Travelers’ Attitude Toward Using User-Generated Content,” Journal of Travel Research 52, no. 4 (February 11, 2013),

doi:10.1177/0047287512475217. 438 56 Ibid, 438

57 C. Noy, “’My Holocaust Experience Was Great!: Entitlements for Participation in Museum Media,” Discourse &

Communication 10, no. 3 (February 8, 2016), doi:10.1177/1750481315623901. 2

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for those who write comments.59_{They also have the potential to include a form of sampling}

bias, as such books only capture input from those visitors that are willing to provide

comments in such an open, publicly accessible form,60_{thus one may not be getting a}

well-rounded look at the opinions of all different types of visitors.

By visiting, you too can become a better person! The tourist narrative

of transformation at sites of Holocaust memory

Chapter 1

Travel as transformative

Tourists are often seen as fundamentally relaxed actors, their motivations summed up

entirely by a need or a desire for leisure and recreation, and their travels and voyages mainly

focused around exploring sites or spaces in order to relax or to get away from it all. However,

the act of individuals and groups journeying and visiting other countries and places outside

what is normally known and experienced has also long been upheld for its perceptive

inherent educational and changeable attributes “no other human activity…has greater

59 Ibid, 120-123

60 Chia-Li Chen, “Representing and Interpreting Traumatic History: A Study of Visitor Comment Books at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum,” Museum Management and Curatorship 27, no. 4 (October 2012), 379

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potential to alter your perceptions or the ways you choose your life.”61_{Tourism revolves}

around the need to travel, to move away from what is seen as the familiar and tame “the

tourist moves on purpose…the purpose is new experiences…of a new and different

experience, of the experience of difference and novelty.”62_{As such tourists travel is primarily}

concerned with the quest for the idea of the “other”, and it is the tourists encounter with a

novel, exotic and unfamiliar experience that has the potential to awaken or change the

worldviews of the one who experiences it. As such travel is deemed by many to be

potentially transformative, be this educational, sociological and psychological, by allowing

the traveller or tourist to experience new cultures, sites and peoples that they are unfamiliar

with. As Reisinger notes, [travel] “can change one’s assumptions, expectations, worldviews

and fundamental structures of the self. Travel can offer a journey to a new awareness,

development and growth.”63

Although contemporary tourism is generally posited around both this idea and a broader

notion of escape from modernity and modern life, voyages that promised potential

self-change or transformation are not new. The 16th_{and 17}th_{century journeys of young}

aristocratic men on their Grand Tours around the sites of antiquity and contemporary

Europe were ostensibly focused around such a rite of passage helping to provide a classical

education and a subsequent transformation of said men into true upper class adult

gentlemen “[the tour would] polish and form the manners of our liberal youth and…fit them

for the business and conversation of the world.”64_{In the 50s and 60s, hitchhikers and hippies}

61 Jeffrey A. Kottler, “The Therapeutic Benefits of Structured Travel Experiences,” Journal of Clinical Activities, Assignments

& Handouts in Psychotherapy Practice 1, no. 1 (January 2001), doi:10.1300/j182v01n01_04. 30

62 Zgyment Bauman, “From Pilgrim to Tourist - or A Short History of Identity,” in Questions of Cultural Identity, ed. S Hall and P. D Gay (London: Sage, 1996). 29

63 Yvette Reisinger, ed., Transformational Tourism: Host Perspectives (United Kingdom: CABI Publishing, 2015). 5 64 RICHARD DE RITTER, “‘This Changeableness in character’: Exploring Masculinity and Nationhood on James Boswell’s Grand Tour,” Scottish Literary Review 2, no. 1 (2010), accessed June 14, 2016,

http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/51782406/this-changeableness-character-exploring-masculinity-nationhood-james-boswells-grand-tour. 23

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also searched for freedom, spiritual fulfilment and personal change through vagabonding

and other forms of minimal cost travel.65_{Following the critique by media, academia and}

others on the cultural, environmental and social impact of tourism and increasing attention

on ethical and sustainable living. In recent years, a new specifically transformative strata of

travel has been identified in which tourists explicitly seek experiences and destinations that

will reward them with self-change or alteration. This became known as transformative

tourism, and was brought into the scholarly discourse by Kottler in the late 90s as a process

that involves the actualisation of something missing from the tourist’s everyday life. It is

driven by “intellectual curiosity, emotional need, or physical challenge,”66_{or the more simple}

explanation of “the practice of organised tourism that leads to a positive change in attitudes

and values among those that participate in the tourism experience.”67_{Rather than}

unconsciously achieving self-change through the act of meeting people at exotic and

different destinations, transformative tourists seek tailor-made transformative experiences,

deciding on said destinations or activities by the self-change perceived to be made possible

there. Examples of such travels are backpacking, visits to spiritual centres, yoga tourism,

and extreme sports, and, as this thesis will hopefully show - aspects of dark tourism. With

the emergence of transformative tourism as a scholarly topic, a number of linking questions

have also emerged. Firstly, it is questionable whether all tourists can potentially experience

self-change or transformation organically by just being in a transformative space and

enjoying its given experiences, or whether tourists must actively seek out such a self-change.

Some scholars have suggested that a search for transformation and self-change underlies all

65 Camille Caprioglio O’Reilly, “From Drifter to Gap Year Tourist,” Annals of Tourism Research 33, no. 4 (2016), accessed June 14, 2016, doi:10.1016/j.annals.2006.04.002, http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160738306000545. 66 Cited in Yvette Reisinger, ed., Transformational Tourism: Host Perspectives (United Kingdom: CABI Publishing, 2015). 11 67 Tazim Jamal, Blanca A Camargo, and Erica Wilson, “Critical Omissions and New Directions for Sustainable Tourism: A Situated Macro–Micro Approach,” Sustainability 5, no. 11 (October 29, 2013), accessed June 14, 2016,

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aspects of modern tourism, stating that the human urges for meaning and fulfilment are

illustrated through the touristic search for escaping and seeking, and that transformative

tourism represents an escape from everyday life through the search for the authentic and

true self.68_{Smith and Reisinger stress that transformation can happen to all tourists if they}

are prepared for such a change.69_{On the other hand, Ross argues that tourists and travellers}

cannot just stumble onto self-change through tourism but must decide to conscientiously

embark on a travel or a challenge that they feel will be potentially transformative.70_Pollock

also argues that transformative travel is only accessible to a specific section of travellers, so

called “conscious travellers” who have a different outlook to that of normal everyday tourists

– she notes that conscious tourists are motivated by self-discovery and seemingly exhibit a

greater care for places visited and search for a deeper sense of meaning when they travel.71

As I will argue in chapter 3, the notion of authenticity is also very important for

contemporary transformative tourists, for the new strata of tourists, transformation through

travel revolves around the idea of the self being fundamentally changed, from an old self to

a new self through experiences that are deemed authentic and real. As such tourists seek

Wang’s notion of existential authenticity, a state of being in which one feels a connection to

their true, authentic self that is activated by participation by perceived authentic tourist

experiences at authentic sites of memory.72

68 Dean MacCannell and Lucy R. Lippard, The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1999).

69 Yvette Reisinger, Transformational Tourism: Tourist Perspectives (London: CABI, 2013), https://books.google.nl/books? hl=en&lr=&id=JU92Myyjk1YC&oi=fnd&pg=PR5&dq=transformational+tourism+

+tourist+perspective&ots=scUCijF8xh&sig=dfuPz4TZb_QLjf0lqox_DlpDAqk#v=onepage&q=transformational%20tourism %20-%20tourist%20perspective&f=false. 5

70 Susan L. Ross, “Transformative Travel: An Enjoyable Way to Foster Radical Change,” ReVision 32, no. 1 (January 1, 2010), doi:10.4298/revn.32.1.54-62.

71 Cited in Renata Tomljenović and Irena Ateljević, Transtourism – Operational Definition and Typology of Trans-formative

travel experiences, (Zagreb, Croatia: Croatian Science Foundation, 2015),

http://www.transtourism.com/perch/resources/Files/a1o2-tt-working-definition-and-typology.pdf. 4

72 Ning Wang, “Rethinking Authenticity in Tourism Experience,” Annals of Tourism Research 26, no. 2 (April 1999), doi:10.1016/s0160-7383(98)00103-0. 350-351

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What is Transformation?

In order to assist our understanding, it may be useful to briefly clarify some terms, most

notably that of personal transformation. When used the sense of tourism and tourists, what

is transformation? In its simplest definition, to transform is to be changed, the changing of

one’s character, substance or function,73_{yet this in and of itself is not a sufficient notion of}

such a complex concept. Morgan instead defines transformation as “inner psychological

development or growth.”74_{Thus, as we shall go on to see one’s inner self can experience}

growth or development through a number a different ways, both educational and

emotional.

For such a change to occur, an environment that is conducive to self-transformation is

required. Similar to Merizow’s transformational learning theory, personal transformation is

preceded by a disorienting dilemma that disrupts the regularity and order of an individual’s

current life.75_{Such dilemmas can occur, for example through stress, reading a poignant book,}

or, the in the tourism sense, having an encounter with a new and unfamiliar space or

environment. Reisinger argues that having a disorientating dilemma causes an individual to

question accepted knowledge about themselves and the wider world, which encourages the

individual’s self-reflection and expansion of consciousness, eventually leading to a concrete

transformation.76_{Thus, transformation describes the changing of one’s consciousness or}

self-identity enabling one to then see the world in a new way. Through the transformative

process individuals aim to gain a new and clearer idea of the world outside their current

73 Dictionary.com (Dictionary.com), s.v “The definition of transform” accessed June 14, 2016, http://www.dictionary.com/browse/transform.

74 Alun David Morgan, “Journeys into Transformation,” Journal of Transformative Education 8, no. 4 (November 14, 2011), accessed July 4, 2016, doi:10.1177/1541344611421491, http://jtd.sagepub.com/content/8/4/246. 247

75 Jack Mezirow, “A Critical Theory of Adult Learning and Education,” Adult Education Quarterly 32, no. 1 (September 1981), accessed June 14, 2016, doi:10.1177/074171368103200101, http://aeq.sagepub.com/content/32/1/3.short. 7 76 Yvette Reisinger, ed., Transformational Tourism: Host Perspectives (United Kingdom: CABI Publishing, 2015). 11

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familiarity.77_{There are, however, different types of transformation that travellers can gain}

from visit to transformative sites. Such a personal transformation can be firmly based in

education, in which tourists transform themselves through the gaining of further knowledge,

which influences and develops or even completely changes their previous worldviews.78

Transformation can also be more spiritual or emotion- based. To view it in its dark tourism

context, tourists desire to live an experience that provides a connection between

themselves, the site visited, and the previous inhabitants or victims of that site. Tourists seek

an act of witnessing, through which they perceive they will be able to authentically

experience and understand an event which they themselves were unable to witness “[an]

act of witness intended to bring us to the brink of human existence, to a space between life

and death…edging us into barely imagined terrors.”79_{As we shall see, there are many}

parallels with the tourist’s voyage to sites of dark tourism, and religious or sacred

pilgrimages.80_{Ergo, tourists desire to gain a previously unavailable understanding, a linkage}

between then and now that will enable a more personalised remembrance and allow them

to a certain extent to place themselves within the historical narrative. We must then

question whether sites of Holocaust memory, specifically the Anne Frank Huis and

Auschwitz-Birkenau are environments conducive to self-transformation. Do visits to said

spaces disorient tourists, either emotionally or educationally and as such allow them to

reflect and change their views or outlooks? And how are these spaces constructed by both

external and internal actors as locations where transformation is deemed possible?

77 Ibid, 11-12

78 Renata Tomljenović and Irena Ateljević, Operational Definition and Typology of Trans-formative travel experiences, (Zagreb, Croatia: Croatian Science Foundation, 2015), http://www.transtourism.com/perch/resources/Files/a1o2-tt-working-definition-and-typology.pdf. 8

79 Quoted in Paul Antick, Itourist? Journeys through the Holocaust, 2015, accessed December 7, 2015,

http://www.academia.edu/6721925/itourist_Journeys_Through_the_Holocaust. 18

80 Noga Collins-Kreiner, “Dark Tourism As/is Pilgrimage,” Current Issues in Tourism September 3, 2015, doi:10.1080/13683500.2015.1078299.

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Transformative ritual and the Holocaust as sacred

To a certain extent, the notion of travel and the transformative in travel is tied up with the

notion of sacred sites and pilgrimage to them. As Keil notes “the term holiday derives from

the term ‘holy day’, establishing a sense common to both of time set aside and dedicated to

a special purpose, separated from a person’s normal life.”81_{Although “ordinary” dark tourists}

differ from pilgrims, there are many similarities that connect them, and it is undoubtedly the

Holocausts framing as sacred, and the construction of the site of Auschwitz-Birkenau as the

epitome of sacred spaces that gives rise to the notion that visiting sites of Holocaust

memory is linked to a transformative and revelatory experience. “Auschwitz cannot be

explained, nor can it be visualised…the Holocaust transcends history.”82

Since the mid-60s, especially in Western political and social consciousness, the Holocaust

has become enveloped in the idea of the sacred and the solemn. De Prees argues that there

are three rules that govern acceptable representations and outlooks on the Holocaust as an

event and the sites associated with it:

1. The Holocaust shall be represented in its totality, as a unique event, 2. Representations

of the event shall be as accurate and faithful as possible to the facts and conditions of the

event, 3. The Holocaust shall be approached as a solemn and sacred event with a

seriousness admitting no response that might obscure its enormity and dishonour its

dead.83

81 Chris Keil, “Sightseeing in the Mansions of the Dead,” Social & Cultural Geography 6, no. 4 (August 2005), doi:10.1080/14649360500200197. 480

82 Elie Wiesel in Peter Novick, The Holocaust in American Life, (New York : Houghton Miffin , 1999), 211.

83 Terrence De Pres, “Holocaust Laughter,” in Writing and the Holocaust, ed. Berel Lang (New York: Holmes and Meier, 1988).217

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Although following the end of the Second World War, the Holocaust was neither posited as a

unique event or a uniquely Jewish event, this changed following the Six Day War.84_Though

the Holocaust is seemingly bound by time and occupies a plain similar to that of all historical

events, this notion is controversial, “[The Holocaust] lies outside, if not beyond history.”85_As

such, underlying this notion of sacredness is the idea that the Holocaust is an event that

defies comparison, existing as a singular, unique or unprecedented event. Prosomo

addresses the idea of a historical and a metaphysical Holocaust; the historical Holocaust is

placed in the dimensions of European or Jewish history, an understandable event, whereas

the metaphysical Holocaust is characterized as unknowable, unprecedented and

indescribable86_{- a unique event}87_{. This notion of uniqueness also includes a subtext, both}

the uniqueness of evil and the uniqueness of the Jews as victims controversially places the

Holocaust and Holocaust memory in an untouchable prism, unquestionable. Its uniqueness

is held to be undeniable and therefore our memory of the Holocaust is potentially

unchangeable. In a world where there is no clearly defined absolute good, Auschwitz is

displayed as an absolute evil, an evil that must be witnessed if it is to be forever stopped.88

As discussed in the brief history of Auschwitz–Birkenau in the introduction, this site has been

at the forefront of differing claims to sacredness by different affected victim groups, and the

framing of memorials has meant that certain historical or national narratives have been seen

as more prominent than others. As James Young notes, the memorialisation of a specific

memory through the representation of a constructed image or memorial affects the

84Norman G. Finkelstein, The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering: With a New Foreword

and Postscript (London: Verso Books, 2001). 42

85 Elle Wiesel in Norman G. Finkelstein, The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering: With a

New Foreword and Postscript (London: Verso Books, 2001). 45

86

87 Prosono Marvin "Remembering for the future - The Holocaust in an age of Genocide," Memory, Vol. 111, ed. John K Roth, Elisabeth Maxwell (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2001).386

88 Jennifer Hansen-Glucklich, Holocaust Memory Reframed: Museums and the Challenges of Representation (United States: Rutgers University Press, 2014). 195

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collective memory of a group or a country.89_{Memorials are spaces where memory is}

moulded to a particular ideal, viewpoint or politic dependant on who desires them,

“depending on where and by whom these memorials are constructed, these sites remember

the past according to a variety of national myths, ideals and political needs.”90_{As we shall}

see, many Holocaust memorial sites are intrinsically linked to the idea of Jewish identity. For

dark tourists and other visitors, this perceived special, sacred and singular nature of the

Holocaust is linked to the contemporary iconography of the Holocaust put forth by other

media representations and fuelled by a sense of obligation, to see, to witness and to

understand such a traumatic and unique event.

As noted above, one of the main contemporary narratives moulded by Holocaust memorials

has been that of the sacred mythical site. Holocaust sites take on the role of graveyards or

cemeteries, imbued by an aura of sacred death.91_{Speaking about Auschwitz-Birkenau}

Pollock notes “Auschwitz is thus not simply a site….it signifies an encounter with death, and

as such signifies a stupefying absence, the destroyed millions who signified furthermore, the

destruction of one of the civilisations of Europe.”92_{Sites are reframed and reclaimed by}

survivors and predominantly Jewish visitors, turning them into sites for memorialisation.

Both survivors and tourists can play the role of pilgrims, performing rituals of remembrance

for the suffering that took place there:

For most, the trip is a once in a lifetime ritual undertaken with a sense of obligation and

foreboding. It offers a chance to enter the tragic past for the sole purpose of witnessing.

89 James Young, The Texture of Memory: Holocaust Memorials and Meaning in Europe, Israel, and America (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993). 1

90 Ibid, 1

91 Janet Jacobs, “From the Profane to the Sacred: Ritual and Mourning at Sites of Terror and Violence,” Journal for the

Scientific Study of Religion 43, no. 3 (September 2004), doi:10.1111/j.1468-5906.2004.00237.x.

92 Griselda Pollock, “Holocaust Tourism: Being There, Looking Back and the Ethics of Spatial Memory,” in Visual culture and

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For a few it is more multifaceted, an opportunity to explore ones roots, to untangle and

refashion shards of memory, to try out another possible homeland, to anchor ones ethnic

self.93

For tourists, the sacred is lived through thanotophic experiences, an up-close and personal

symbolic encounter with death.94_{There is an underlying assumption that visiting such sites}

provide travellers with a way to vicariously connect with the dead, and experience a

transformative experience, through doing so “visitors may bring with them the sense that to

enter the KZ universe will be to cross a major experiential threshold into the transcendent.”95

Because of some of the reasons noted above, sites of Holocaust memory are perceived to be

imbued with a certain spirt of place, the function of relationships between the physical and

spiritual elements “that give meaning, value, emotion and mystery to the place.”96_Places

where sacred power appears to manifest are perceived by visitors as breaks in the usual

space-time boundaries and thus this notion of transformative sacred space is intrinsically

linked into the idea of the real and the “authentic.” Primarily the idea that past events

happened on this very spot – “right here”, and to stand right where it happened is perceived

to enable an experience of identification between current visitors and dead victims.

These were the scratches made by those trying desperately to hold on to every last inch

of life that they could… these were the scratches of lost hope. As I ran my fingers along

the rubble – I felt the cool chill of death pass through my body, I could feel the rigid

surface beneath my fingers, each new mark representing a new death….My hand

93 Erica T Lehrer, Jewish Poland Revisited Jewish Poland Revisited: Heritage Tourism in Unquiet Places Heritage Tourism in

Unquiet Places (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2013). 4

94 A. V. Seaton, “Guided by the Dark: From Thanatopsis to Thanatourism,” International Journal of Heritage Studies 2, no. 4 (December 1996), doi:10.1080/13527259608722178. 240

95 Chris Keil, "Sightseeing in the Mansions of the Dead," Social & Cultural Geography 6, no. 4 (August 2005): 479–494, doi:10.1080/14649360500200197. 483

96 Quebec declaration on the preservation of the spirit of place (Québec,: ICOMOS, 2008),

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suddenly stood still as if the sorrow and pain etched into these – were going into my hand

and seeping into my heart.”97

Thus what is perceived as “authentic” sites of Holocaust memory have been reframed as

sacred sites, moving them from ordinary topographical spaces into the realm of the

extraordinary. As such they are perceived as containing a symbolic and real atmosphere or

ambience, the more natural, real or authentic a place is perceived, the more it is considered

a sacred place.98

The perceived atmosphere or aura that tourists understand to be infused in such sacred

places can be understood to be a kind of numumosity. Numen as outlined by theologian

Rudolf Otto stems from a Latin term meaning a nod or beckon from the gods.99_{It refers to}

elements of eeriness, mysteriousness and astonishment that visitors experience when they

enter certain sites, as well as representing a felt “shiver of contact” – a want by tourists of a

seeming affective, personal and tangible connection between the inhabitants of the past and

the visitor of today,100_{“the shiver of contact with ancient sites [bringing] to life their}

lingering barbarity or sanctity.”101_{Cameron and Gatewood contend that there are 3 aspects}

to the numen impulse. Firstly, visitors gain a deep engagement or transcendence when

visiting the site (intense concentration combined with losing the sense of passing time),

secondly, a feeling of empathy (imagining peoples thoughts, feelings, experiences and

hardships they felt at the time) and lastly, a sense of awe and reverence (the sense of being

97 “March of the Living Canada: Speeches,” March of the Living Canada, accessed June 15, 2016, http://marchoftheliving.org/speeches/alyse-dan/.

98 Leanne / White and Elspeth Frew, eds., Dark Tourism and Place Identity: Managing and Interpreting Dark Places(United Kingdom: Taylor & Francis, 2013). 22

99 Stephen Miles, “Battlefield Sites as Dark Tourism Attractions: An Analysis of Experience,” Journal of Heritage Tourism 9, no. 2 (January 9, 2014), doi:10.1080/1743873x.2013.871017. 144-146

100 Catherine M. Cameron and John B. Gatewood, “Seeking Numinous Experiences in the Unremembered Past,” Ethnology 42, no. 1 (January 1, 2003), doi:10.2307/3773809. 57

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on hallowed ground, and the presence of something holy or sacred/ the notion that tourists

feel themselves to be on a pilgrimage).102_{As we shall see in chapter 3, it is not just sites that}

can enable visitors to experience such numenosity but authentic objects too.

Although, as seen in chapter two these behaviours are not universal, the belief that a place

is sacred or holy, influences the behaviours that tourists perceive as legitimate at such a site.

As such, the behaviour of many visitors at Auschwitz-Birkenau revolves around the idea of

the ritual, “stylized repetitive social activity which through the use of symbolism, expresses

and defines social relations.”103_{Tourists leave offerings or sacrifices, establishing a}

continuation or linkage with the site which continues the experience both physically and

mentally after leaving the space.104_{While the sombre nature of the site allows for}

self-reflection, according to Ross a key part of the transformative experience. Critical reflection

on the history behind the site or one’s own previous assumptions allows for the

transformation of ones frame of reference.105_{While visiting Auschwitz-Birkenau, Dalton}

notes that “throughout the entire camp complex one beholds small posies of flowers,

memorial candles, plastic national flags, origami cranes and candle lamps lit on the rail

tracks.”106_{When sacralised, Holocaust spaces become pure and authentic, existing as a spot}

to be forever undisturbed and memorialised. Spaces that are regarded as sacred have an

inbuilt air of permanency, forever acting as a totem or symbol of the event or religion that

transcends the death of followers or witnesses.107_{As Edward Casey notes, “honouring in a}

102 Catherine M. Cameron and John B. Gatewood, “Seeking Numinous Experiences in the Unremembered Past,” Ethnology 42, no. 1 (January 1, 2003), doi:10.2307/3773809. 67-68

103 Christel Lane, The Rites of Rulers: Ritual in Industrial Society - the Soviet Case (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981). 11

104 Leanne White and Elspeth Frew, eds., Dark Tourism and Place Identity: Managing and Interpreting Dark Places (United Kingdom: Taylor & Francis, 2013). 19-20

105 Jack Mezirow, “Transformative Learning: Theory to Practice,” New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education 1997, no. 74 (1997), doi:10.1002/ace.7401. 7

106 Derek Dalton, "Encountering Auschwitz: A Personal Rumination on the Possibilities and Limitations of Witnessing/Remembering Trauma in Memorial Space," Law Text Culture 13, no. 1 (2009). 211

107 Leanne / White and Elspeth Frew, eds., Dark Tourism and Place Identity: Managing and Interpreting Dark Places(United Kingdom: Taylor & Francis, 2013). 18-19

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full bodied way requires more than passing praise. It seeks to preserve and stabilize the

memory of the honouree, and to do so in a time-binding, invariant manner. The explicit aim

is to maintain this memory in the face of the corrosive actions of time’s passing.”108

The guidebook as constructor of narrative

Travel destinations are not formed organically, they do not simply exist but are instead

created by pre-formed perceptions and desires, fears and needs of the tourist or visitor. In

many cases these desires and ideas of what a space represents are influenced by both

fictional media representations,109_{conscious marketing communication, and the factual}

writings of those that have travelled before them, specifically by the travel guide.110

Travel guidebooks act like pathfinders to tourists, both leading visitors as well as imparting

specific sacralised meanings on spaces and sites, thus these guides help to essentially define

what a destination is. Lieper argues that three elements are needed in destination or place

construction: a tourist, a sight, and a marker which identifies the site to the tourist and gives

the site significance. In this context guidebooks fulfil the role of place markers.111_{As well as}

helping tourists choose a destination, guidebook texts also help raise expectations by

announcing potential sights, sounds and experiences that the tourist might encounter while

at a place. As Urry notes, what the tourist wants to view and the tourist gaze itself may in

many cases be defined by anticipation of what is to be expected.112_{What is outlined, as well}

as what is left unannounced can therefore shape and sculpt the tourist’s experience,

108 Edward S. Casey, Remembering: A Phenomenological Study ( Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 1987), p. 226 109 Mike Crang, “Cultural Geographies of Tourism,” in The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Tourism, ed. Alan Lew (n.p.: Wiley-Blackwell, 2014). 69

110Ibid, 69

111 Neil Leiper, “Tourist Attraction Systems,” Annals of Tourism Research 17, no. 3 (January 1990), doi:10.1016/0160-7383(90)90004-b. 271

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defining the places deemed desirable and undesirable and influencing both travellers given

behaviours and satisfaction at and with a chosen space. “[Travel guides] do not just describe

places but set normative agendas,”113_{“They seek to create a restorative experience.”}114_Thus

the following section will question to what extent travel guides outline a narrative to tourists

that both stresses the inevitability of self-change and prescribes an expected behaviour for

tourists at sights of Holocaust memory.

Although still lacking a universal definition,115_{what tourists have come to know as}

guidebooks and travel guides first came into prominence in the 1830s, with the Murray

Handbook and Baedeker travel guide being among the first of the form as we would

understand it today, although these books were used more by strangers and immigrants

attempting to familiarise themselves with a city or place than tourists.116_{In the middle of the}

20th_{century, Lonely Planet travel guides and Rough Guides emerged and attempted to}

convey a distinctive independent experience for nomad tourists and backpackers.117_In

recent years the continued use of guidebooks by tourists for planning trips and travel has

been under increasing threat thanks to the availability of instant and free digital resources

on offer to the potential traveller, such as Google Maps, Skyscanner, and TripAdvisor and

many others. Although still somewhat understudied in academia,118_{travel guides continue to}

113 Bouke Van Gorp, “Guidebooks and the Representation of ‘Other’ Places,” in Strategies for tourism industry - micro and

macro perspectives, by Murat Kasimoğlu and Handan Aydin (Rijeka: InTech, 2012). 4

114 Alan A. Lew, “Place Representation in Tourist Guidebooks: An example from Singapore,” Singapore Journal of Tropical

Geography 12, no. 2 (December 1991), doi:10.1111/j.1467-9493.1991.tb00034.x. 3

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