Critical Thinking/Discussion Questions - Rosemary May

  1. Rosemary May explains about the structure of the concentration camp: “You see, one of the German’s bizarre ways of doing this was they did not run the camps internally, none of them. They had the Jewish inmates run the camps internally, including punishment, doling out punishment. The kapos, they were given the order to do such and such, and they just had to do it.” Why do you think the Nazis set up this kind of deliberate system in the concentration camps? Explain.
  2. How did the Nazis effort to turn Theresienstadt into a ‘model camp’ for the Red Cross visit in the summer of 1944, as described by Rosemary May, reflect their larger effort to use sanitary language and deception when describing the vast network of concentration and extermination camps across Europe?
  3. Many of the children in the Theresienstadt Camp created poems and drawings of both their lives and about the conditions in the camp. Using the two links below from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum explaining children's art and poetry in Theresienstadt, record your thoughts about how artwork reinforces the idea of non-violent resistance against the Nazis?

      CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ABOUT CHILDREN'S ART & POETRY IN THERESIENSTADT

CLICK HERE TO VIEW ART

(n.d.). Retrieved April 29, 2017, https://www.ushmm.org/research/publications/academic-publications/full-list-of-academic-publications/i-never-saw-another-butterfly-childrens-drawings-and-poems-from-terezin