The Affective Entanglements of the Visitor Experience at Holocaust Sites and Museums

Abstract

Making sense of the entanglements of affective flows and material assemblages at Holocaust sites and museums reveals the complex nature of the visitor experience. As researchers of emergent pedagogies of the history discipline, we are interested in non-traditional approaches to teaching history including affect, diffraction, and duo-ethnography. As conscientious visitors, we use all of our senses, as well as our minds and memories, to derive and construct authentic personalized meaning. In this chapter, we specifically discuss our affective engagement with the Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site, the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin, the Holocaust Exhibition at the Imperial War Museum in London, and the newly created Adelaide Holocaust Museum and Andrew Steiner Education Centre (AHMSEC) in Australia. The post-qualitative methods we have employed in this chapter assist us to understand the uniquely transformative visitor experience at Holocaust sites and museums.