Introduction & Preface

Goals for today 
Contextual introduction If this is a Man
Introduction of the author 
Preface and writing tone and purpose 

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Slide 1: Tekstslide
EngelsUpper Secondary (Key Stage 4)GCSE

In deze les zitten 24 slides, met interactieve quizzen en tekstslides.

Onderdelen in deze les

Goals for today 
Contextual introduction If this is a Man
Introduction of the author 
Preface and writing tone and purpose 

Slide 1 - Tekstslide

Published in Italian 1958
Translation English 1960

Slide 2 - Tekstslide

Who was targeted?

Slide 3 - Woordweb

Who were the perpetrators?

Slide 4 - Woordweb

What was the goal?

Slide 5 - Woordweb

Where did it take place?

Slide 6 - Woordweb

The Holocaust (literary means burnt offering) 
  • homosexuals ​
  • The genocide of European Jews during World War II by Nazi Germany was fuelled by antisemitism (hatred of Jews)​. 
  • It was the implementation of Hitler’s “Final Solution”, an infamous euphemism for the Nazis’ plan to wipe out European Jewry to allow the “Aryan race” to triumph​
  • This was part of a larger effort to eradicate ‘undesirables’ (Untermenschen: sub-humans) from Europe, so many other groups were targeted as well as Jews, including:​ ethnic Poles​, Romany Gypsies​, the disabled​, black and mixed race people, Political and religious activists​, homosexuals. 

Slide 7 - Tekstslide

Untermenschen from every area of Nazi-occupied Europe were rounded up and sent to camps​
This is a map showing the areas of control of the different powers in World War II. ​
Grey areas are those fully or partly occupied and controlled by Nazi Germany​

Slide 8 - Tekstslide

The Holocaust 
In the camps, occupants were subjected to appalling abuse, starvation, disease and torture​. There was also forced sterilisation, and other horrific medical experiments were carried out:​
  • Live dissection without anaesthesia​
  • Deliberate infection with tuberculosis and malaria​
  • Injection with poisons or bacteria​
Various methods were used to exterminate those rounded up:​
  • Labour camps / Mass shootings / Gas chambers / Death marches

Slide 9 - Tekstslide

The Holocaust 
In the camps, occupants were subjected to appalling abuse, starvation, disease and torture​. There was also forced sterilisation, and other horrific medical experiments were carried out:​
  • Live dissection without anaesthesia​
  • Deliberate infection with tuberculosis and malaria​
  • Injection with poisons or bacteria​
Various methods were used to exterminate those rounded up:​
  • Labour camps / Mass shootings / Gas chambers / Death marches

Slide 10 - Tekstslide

Slide 11 - Link

Principles of Nazi Ideology​
Fascist: far-right political philosophy, opposed to democracy and liberalism, characterised by dictatorships, use of force against opponents and strong regimentation of society and the economy​
Racial theories: used Darwinian ideas of natural selection and survival of the fittest to support the idea of a master German race that must be protected from Jews, blacks, the disabled and other ' Untermenschen'  
Nazi
National Socialism = Nationalsozialismus 

Slide 12 - Tekstslide

Principles of Nazi Ideology​
Aggressive territorial expansion: conquering Europe to gain Lebensraum (living space) for the German people​

Women excluded from public life: women were to be relegated to Kinder, Küche, Kirche (Children, Kitchen, Church). Very traditional role expected – marrying and having children. Contraception and abortion were punishable by prison (only for ‘racially valuable’ women – abortions were encouraged for 'Untermenschen')​

Slide 13 - Tekstslide

Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler were both fascists​

Slide 14 - Tekstslide

How did Hitler rise to power? 

Slide 15 - Tekstslide

Primo Levi 
  • An Italian Jewish chemist whose story of being taken to Auschwitz and surviving the Holocaust is the subject of this text. 
  • Born in Turin, Italy in 1919, he was academically gifted and studied chemistry at the University of Turin. His degree certificate had the remark “of Jewish race” which prevented him from finding a suitable job.​
  • A lifelong hiking enthusiast and member of the Italian resistance, he took to the foothills of the Alps and was arrested by the Fascist militia in 1943. He was detained in an Italian internment camp later taken over by the Nazis. He was transported from there to Auschwitz in Feb 1944.​
  • Of the 650 Italian Jews in his transport, he was one of only twenty who left the camp alive in January 1945.​

Slide 16 - Tekstslide

  • In his writings, Levi is appalled by how easily the Nazis were able to commit genocide while seeming to be so ordinary, because they were simply “doing their duty”. ​
  • Similarly, Levi was appalled at how the people in the camps behaved: ​
  • Jews who did the Nazis’ bidding and kept discipline, often cruelly​
  • Many had to become incredibly selfish – theft and lies were common to survive​
  • Prisoners would use and abuse each other to gain favours or advantages from the Nazis​
  • Levi found the injustice of some people surviving and others not very difficult. 

Slide 17 - Tekstslide

If this is a Man
The text is difficult to categorise. It can be viewed as: 
  • Memoir 
  • Testimony 
  • Diary 
  • Moral Fable
  • Confession 
  • Consider, as you read, how you would categorise it. 

Slide 18 - Tekstslide

If this is a Man - what ideas and thoughts does this title suggest to you?

Slide 19 - Open vraag

Survival in Auschwitz 
This is title that the translation of this text had in the USA. 

1. Why do you think that a direct translation of the Italian title: questo è un uomo, was not used for the American publication? 
2. What is lost or gained by changing the title of this text? 
3. What could be lost in translation? 
Discuss

Slide 20 - Tekstslide

Preface - why? 
First line: “It was my good fortune to be deported to Auschwitz only in 1944” 
Last line: “It seems to me unnecessary to add that none of the facts are invented”
1. How would you describe the tone of this writer? 
2. Why is the last line important? What are Levi's aims as he states them in the preface? 
A preface is an introduction at the beginning of a book, which explains what the book is about or why it was written.

Slide 21 - Tekstslide

Preface - why? 
“to furnish documentation for a quiet study of certain aspects of the human mind.”
“the structural defects of the book,” 
“the character of an immediate and violent impulse.”
Document 
Inform 
Participate
Emotional outpouring 
Logical reasoning 

Slide 22 - Tekstslide

Reading homework 
For Wednesday 8th May read chapters "The Journey" and "On the Bottom" - chapters 1 & 2 
Text in MB and in Teams 

Slide 23 - Tekstslide

A Brief History of the Jews 

Slide 24 - Tekstslide