Childhood belongings. Immanence of education. Resistance and resilience under the nazism regime: from Anneliese Treumann and Lina Moos’ letters (1933-1942)

Abstract

In 1933 Anneliese Treumann turned ten (Fazio, 2023). Her peaceful childhood in her Jewish family was replaced by the persecutions with Oma Lina, until deportation and unknown death. Yet, in her letters childhood is present, in the furniture moving from house to house, the dowry, the books, in her grandfather’s words: head up. Family education, infused with German-Jewish Bildung (Kaiser, 1999), nourishes the resistance (Mantegazza, 2021): Anneliese never stops carrying on, showing herself in a good mood, longing to do and to learn.

Looking at family as the primary source of resilience, considering the problematic relationship between pedagogy and Shoah (Mantegazza, 2010; Vaccarelli, 2023), this study explores, through Anneliese Treumann and Lina Moos’ letters, the connection of childhood, resistance and resilience in the dictatorship, focusing on the value of things that make home and adapt to the world (Coccia, 2021) by embodying and saving the secure base (Bowlby, 1988).