{"id":4794,"date":"2024-10-23T21:29:45","date_gmt":"2024-10-23T20:29:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/reframe.sussex.ac.uk\/digitalholocaustmemory\/?p=4794"},"modified":"2024-10-24T15:53:22","modified_gmt":"2024-10-24T14:53:22","slug":"three-phases-of-digital-holocaust-memory-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/reframe.sussex.ac.uk\/digitalholocaustmemory\/2024\/10\/23\/three-phases-of-digital-holocaust-memory-development\/","title":{"rendered":"Three Phases of Digital Holocaust Memory Development"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Professor Victoria Grace Richardson-Walden<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Through artificial intelligence, machine learning, crowdsourcing, digitisation, VR, AR and computer games, we take you on a tour of some of the world\u2019s most prolific digital Holocaust memory initiatives by way of the theory of the \u2018three stages\u2019 of development.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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To argue that there are three phases of digital Holocaust memory development is not to suggest a clear and simple historical chronology from the 1990s \u2013 when digital technologies were first introduced into this arena \u2013 to now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rather, this proposition offers a framework for mapping the different types of approaches organisations take when adopting digital media for the sake of Holocaust memory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These three phases are: the experimental, the normative, and the connective, and they define the different relationships organisations have with digital technology and cultures through their work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s take a closer look at each of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Experimental Phase<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

This phase acknowledges periods of enthusiasm for a new medium,  often led by a \u2018what if?\u2019 curiosity among a handful of digital advocates or a desire to shake up the status quo.

During this phase, creators are explorative and playful with a medium\u2019s possibilities, they\u2019re not afraid to take risks and can be inquisitive about the potential \u2018newness\u2019 or distinctions of an emerging platform or technology. These projects seem to ask: how might a particular medium support new approaches to Holocaust memory and education?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some examples of digital Holocaust memory in the experimental phase would be:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Social Media<\/strong>:<\/summary>\n

The Facebook page for Henio Zytomirski \u2013 a famous Jewish child victim from Lublin, Poland. Posts on the page would shift between the third-and first-person. Users could \u2018poke\u2019 Henio and share messages on his wall, from virtual gifts to invitations to play online games. The profile was launched by Grodzka Gate-NN Teater in Lublin<\/a> and experimented with the possibilities of Facebook in its early days. Yet, it also violated the platform\u2019s rules by creating a profile of someone no longer alive. The project did echo an earlier non-digital campaign led by Grodska Gate called \u2018Letters to Henio\u2019,<\/a> in which school children would write to him. The transition to Facebook, however, allowed them to explore the different ways young people might communicate with him through social media.<\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

Virtual Reality<\/strong>:<\/summary>\n

In 2014, Future Memory Foundation<\/a>, SPECS Lab<\/a> and Eodyne<\/a> released the \u2018Spaces of Memory\u2019<\/a> installation and app at the Bergen-Belsen Memorial<\/a>. This project was led by a research team building on Prof. Paul Verschure\u2019s neuroscience research, which demonstrates not only the significance of experimental learning but the effect of spatial contextualisation of objects and information on (recall) memory. \u2018Spaces of Memory\u2019 combined models of the camp\u2019s structures with snippets from testimonies and photographs for learners to find by navigating to pinpoints on an Augmented or Virtual Reality presentation of the site, whilst located at the actual former concentration camp. The project has led to the development of several further AR and VR apps at other sites across Europe.augmented or virtual reality presentation of the site, whilst located at the actual former concentration camp. The project has led to the development of several further AR and VR apps at other sites across Europe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other projects have made use of Head-Mounted Displays and hand controllers to think through ways to let users explore historical spaces, experimenting with how to allow the user to interact with objects and get a visceral sense of small hiding spaces, whilst maintaining a historical distance. See for example Lipke Bunker VR<\/a>(\u017danis Lipke Memorial, Latvia<\/a>) and Anne Frank House VR<\/a> (<\/em>Anne Frank House<\/a>).<\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

Augmented Reality:<\/strong><\/summary>\n

Whilst it has become quite common place to use AR technologies to situate historical photographs where they were taken, Dachau Memorial\u2019s ARt app<\/a> uses the same framework (from ZaubAR, Germany) adopted for its photo-based Liberation app<\/a> to place the artwork of survivors and their family in locations throughout the memorial. The mix of different types of artworks and occasional interactive elements suggests this was very much an experimentation of what is possible, and much discussion was had between memorial staff and the creative and technical team at ZaubAR about limitations and ethical boundaries. The content includes a powerful drawing of rollcall, which the user can walk through; an interactive through which the user can change the costume of a drawn priest into a concentration camp prisoner, and a comic strip of the arrival process.<\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

AI\/ Machine Learning:<\/strong><\/summary>\n

Circa 2021-22, the idea of \u2018chatbots\u2019 seemed to pique the interest of a number of Holocaust organisations. Arolsen Archives<\/a>, Germany published \u2018Marbles of Remembrance\u2019<\/a> a so-called \u2018chatbot\u2019-led tour of children\u2019s stories of the Holocaust in Berlin via Telegram. The \u2018Houses of Darkness\u2019<\/a> project, for which the memorials at Falstad, Norway<\/a>; Westerbork, the Netherlands<\/a>; and Bergen-Belsen, partnered, has an online \u2018chatbot\u2019 at the core of its website. Yet, these two examples demonstrate the active \u2018digital imagination\u2019 in the Holocaust sector, for whilst they both look like \u2018chatbots\u2019 at the interface, they do not actually make use of AI technologies.<\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

Computer Games:<\/strong><\/summary>\n

Charles Games<\/a>, Prague have arguably adopted the most experimental approach to games about the Holocaust and Nazi Occupation. With Attentat 1942<\/a>, <\/em>they combined photo-realist, cinematic interactive scenes with mini-games, often presented in a more comic-book style animation. The game jumps between the photo-realist present day and animated mini-games situated in the past. Another of their games, Train to Sachsenhausen<\/a> uses the \u2018swipe left\u2019, \u2018swipe right\u2019 logic of contemporary dating apps to encourage users to make choices in historical scenarios.<\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

The Future Projects Department<\/strong>:<\/summary>\n

The Future Projects Department<\/strong> at United States Holocaust Memorial Museum<\/a> is another example of digital Holocaust memory working in an experimental phase. The team have the resource to work on prototypes, carry out user testing, and consider a variety of approaches to using digital (and other) technologies for the sake of Holocaust memory and education without the pressure of releasing every project to the public.<\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

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Dachau Memorial\u2019s ARt app<\/a> includes a powerful drawing of rollcall, which the user can walk through; an interactive through which the user can change a character\u2019s costume into a concentration camp prisoner\u2019s, and a comic strip of the arrival process.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Normative Phase<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

This phase recognises how digital media can be adopted to remediate pre-digital approaches to curatorial or pedagogical practices and\/or broadcast media logics, for example the \u2018one to the masses\u2019 opposed to the \u2018networked\u2019 communication model. It often highlights moments when digital projects are professionalised within institutions (although not always), so this might refer to social media being co-opted by communication departments rather than ran by enthusiastic educators or larger-scale investment being contributed to digital teams (although this is still very rare globally). More commonly, it recognises that organisations are hesitant about the connective and computational possibilities of \u2018the digital\u2019 and prefer to maintain well-established norms in Holocaust memory and education with which they are familiar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some examples of digital Holocaust memory in the normative phase are:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Social Media:<\/strong><\/summary>\n

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum<\/a> (the USHMM) is one of many institutions whose social media is managed by a communications department. Alongside the Auschwitz Memorial<\/a> and Yad Vashem<\/a>, they remains one of the most popular Holocaust organisations on social media. The USHMM\u2019s most common posts tend to present text presenting a historical narrative, sometimes a quotation, and usually a photograph or link. This form replicates the displays boards commonly seen in physical exhibition spaces and is commonly seen across Holocaust organisation social media accounts. Alongside such posts, we also often see others advertising upcoming events or presenting \u2018behind-the-scenes\u2019 videos with curators (as posted by the Neuengamme Memorial<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whilst Holocaust organisations attempted to be more participatory and interactive on social media during Covid, they tended to simulate non-digital forms of engagement, for example, by presenting \u2018micro\u2019 guided tours via Instagram<\/a>. <\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

Virtual Reality:<\/strong><\/summary>\n

The most common adoption of VR in Holocaust museums, especially those situated far away from actual sites of Holocaust violence, is to present 360-degree films of survivor testimonies. These often consist of the user following a survivor through various sites from their past, sometimes these films include historical scenes but more often than not they focus on places as they are today. These include The Last Goodbye<\/a> (USC Shoah Foundation), the various films screened in The Journey Back: VR Experience<\/a> (Illinois Holocaust Museum) and Walk with Me<\/a> (Melbourne Holocaust Museum<\/a>). As they are usually promoted as films, such VR experience tend to require use of a Head-Mounted Display (HMD) only \u2013 no hand controllers.<\/p>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n

AI and  Machine Learning:<\/strong><\/summary>\n

 <\/strong>The flagship machine learning project in Holocaust memory is arguably the USC Shoah Foundation\u2019s Dimensions in Testimony<\/a>.The project uses Natural Language Processing (NLP) to retrieve responses from a 5-day recording with a Holocaust survivor triggered by written or verbal prompts from a user. The creators<\/a> behind the project have long argued that it does not intend to radically alter how we do Holocaust memory and education, rather it hopes to continue  what they consider to be traditional tenets:<\/p>\n\n\n\n