Morina, Christina, and Thijs, Krijn, eds. Probing the Limits of Categorization: The Bystander in Holocaust History

In Probing the Limits of Categorization, Christina Morina and Krijn Thijs, together with eighteen other contributors, seek to map out the field of bystander studies by offering conceptual reflections on the category of the bystander, as well as suggesting ways in which the category can be adjusted and applied to specific historical contexts. Following Raul Hilberg’s introduction of the bystander in 1992, Holocaust research has relied on the triangulation of perpetrator, victim and bystander to examine the plethora of experiences in Nazi Germany. Morina and Thijs assert that, although it seems relatively easy to define the categories of perpetrator and victim, “analyzing the thoughts and actions of the other contemporaries and thus their role in the unfolding of the crime, remains a challenging endeavor in international historiography” (2). The chapters in Probing the Limits of Categorization together offer a comprehensive attempt to provide insight into this category by looking at the agency of individuals in mass violence and suffering. In doing so, the book seeks to deepen our understanding of the Holocaust as a result of an interaction between a state and society, rather than a crime limited to the actions of a singular group of perpetrators. 

The volume is divided into three parts: “Approaches,” “History” and “Memory. “Approaches” examines the historicity and the static–and at times problematic–nature of the term “bystander.” It discusses concepts and methods from different academic fields in order to analyze the bystander position in instances of mass violence. “History” comprises six chapters, each presenting a case study on the relations “between the majority populations and Jewish minorities during the Holocaust in Nazi Germany and occupied Europe” (6). In the last section, “Memory,” chapters focus on public contestation and historiographical notion of the bystander after 1945 in various national contexts from a memory studies perspective. The book closes with two critical epilogues by Ido de Haan and Norbert Frei, who comment on the limits and potential of future research in the field of bystander studies. 

Probing the Limits of Categorization investigates the bystander category from an interdisciplinary perspective, thereby offering a valuable overview of the category in current Holocaust studies for anyone interested in the conceptual and methodological approaches to complicity, implication and the complex position of the bystander. The volume allows for insight in the complex and nuanced social processes involved in state-sponsored violence, thereby opening up ways to think beyond the category of perpetrator and bystander. 

Author of this entry: Marit van de Warenburg