Co-Memory, Negative Memory and the Dilemmas of Translation in the Outtakes from Claude Lanzmann's Shoah

Glowacka considers three decades of Polish criticism of Lanzmann's Shoah in the context of recently published outtakes from the documentary. She explores the role of language interpretation in both the film and the outtakes, focusing on statements in Polish and their French and English translations. The testimonies of Poles whom Lanzmann describes as 'false witnesses; Glowacka suggests, ought to be treated as credible accounts that shed light on the complexity of Polish Holocaust memory. But Lanzmann appropriates this memory, framing the Polish language as subordinate to other languages in the film. She also points out sequences in the outtakes where Polish witnesses' memories coincide with the recollections of Szymon Srebrnik, a survivor of the Chelmno extermination camp. Based on this she proposes to introduce the notion of a co-memory, that is to say a modality of memory that can pose a valuable alternative to the dominant paradigm of conflicting memories.