Heschel, Susannah. “Does Atrocity Have a Gender?”

Susannah Heschel’s essay is one of the few English-language texts that explore the role feminist theory can play in the study of male and female perpetrators of the Holocaust. It also presents an overview of existing (German-language) scholarship on the topic. Focusing on women who were working for or otherwise involved in the SS, Heschel shows how gender stereotypes prevented an adequate investigation and prosecution. Women perpetrators were furthermore often sexualised, whereas this aspect was disregarded when it came to the male perpetrators. The gendered nature of narratives about Nazism and the Holocaust has hindered an adequate coming to terms with the role of women in Nazi crimes and is furthermore perpetuated in media and cultural representations.

Heschel, Susannah. “Does Atrocity Have a Gender? Feminist Interpretations of Women in the SS”. Lessons and Legacies VI: New Currents in Holocaust Research. Ed. by Jeffrey M. Diefendorf. Northwestern University Press, 2004. pp. 300-321.