Holocaust distortion and the creation of Schrödinger’s mass graves: the precarity of truth at sites of Holocaust heritage in Europe

Reviewed by: Do You Hear in the Mountains… and Other Stories by Maïssa Bey Gina Marie Breen Bey, Maïssa. Do You Hear in the Mountains… and Other Stories. Trans. Erin Lamm. U of Virginia P, 2018. ISBN: 978-0-8139-4028-1. $65 (cloth). ISBN: 978-0-8139-4029-8. $25.00 (paper). Maïssa Bey is the author of several essays, novels, poems, and short stories, some of which have been adapted to theatre. Her writing, like that of fellow Algerian women Assia Djebar, Malika Mokaddem and Leila Sebbar, is marked by women's experiences and the historical and political French-Algerian context. Bey's 2002 novella Do You Hear in the Mountains, and the 2004 collection of eleven short stories, Under the Jasmine at Night, appear together in this volume, which is part of the CARAF Books series of the University of Virginia Press. In Do You Hear in the Mountains, Bey speaks the unspoken in order to access the truth and confront French-Algerian taboos that are passed down from generation to generation. Dedicated to her father who "will never be able to read these lines" (3) and to her sons, the story is a critique of violence and a reflection on guilt and responsibility. The story takes place in France aboard a train to Marseille, a strategic point on the Mediterranean and home to many Algerian immigrants and pied-noirs who fled Algeria when it gained Independence. The strained dialogue that drives the [End Page 239] plot transpires among three travelers—an Algerian woman of a certain age, a Frenchman in his sixties, and a young French woman—and establishes the connections between three generations of French-Algerians and between the past, present, and future. The Algerian woman, who is also the narrator, fled the Algerian Civil War of the 1990s and sought refuge in France. The Frenchman was a military doctor stationed in Algeria during the War of Independence in the village where the Algerian woman was born and where her father worked before being tortured, killed, and thrown into a mass grave. Finally, we come full circle with Marie, the granddaughter of a pied-noir who wishes to know more about the past. "Arabs, I'm sure!" (16). This accusation uttered by a first-class passenger who believes the three are responsible for attempted theft is the catalyst for the conversation that follows. The passengers face a dilemma: to speak or remain silent, to question the past or not. Initially, the Algerian woman is uncomfortable and reluctant to converse about her homeland. She is tired of other people's sympathy or nostalgia when they learn she is from Algeria. "That's what they always say about Algeria: 'what a beautiful country!' … She has heard this sentence everywhere, for such a long time, said in a tone of regret during the first few years that followed Independence but now tinged with commiseration" (21). Bey comments on war—those involved on both sides, how one justifies one's own involvement, and how one deals with the aftermath—and as a result, she humanizes both the French and Algerian experiences. She asserts that while one can ignore the violence at first, one cannot entirely block it out. Bey urges us to speak the truth so that we refute false narratives and seek reconciliation instead. In Under the Jasmine at Night, Bey addresses the difficulty of defining women's identity amid the social and cultural realities in Algeria. The stories examine education, immigration, marriage, violence, and motherhood. For example, "In Good Faith upon my Honor," the collection's third story, is about the desire for freedom and the need to express oneself; however, when the protagonist learns her husband will take a new wife, her fear and anger soon dissipate with the sound of her daughter's cries. By remembering all the Algerian women who came before her and suffered similar fates, she is able to regain her strength and power for her daughter's future. Bey's writing is effective because of how she communicates, specifically her ability to describe the challenges of the feminine condition. This is a beautiful and careful translation by Erin...

The notion of ‘European heritage’ plays an increasingly important role in the discursive constructions of a collective sense of European belonging. This Special Issue critically reviews some of the contemporary instrumentalizations of European heritage as processes of borderwork by which various political and non-political actors demarcate the boundaries of Europe and European identity. Specifically, the nine contributions shed light on some of the top-down and bottom-up uses of European heritage and explore whether the borderwork of European heritage delineates and separates Europeanness as an exclusive and singular identity, or whether it constitutes a space of exchange, flow and entanglement where Europeanness is defined as inclusive and pluralistic. Characterized by interdisciplinarity, methodological variety and a conception of Europe broader than the European Union, this Special Issue aims to broaden the scope of scholarship in European studies and (critical) heritage studies.

The high number of dead bodies to deal with in time of mortality crises (events marked by an unusually high number of dead in a limited amount of time) often leads to modifications in the traditional funerary practices of a society. This contribution questions the way Ancient Greeks, from the 8th till the 3rd century BC, handled such mortality crises, focusing on mass burials. In a first methodological part, we discuss the means to identify funerary sites related to mortality crises, using the methods of archaeothanatology. By confronting archaeological features (taphonomic processes, position of the remains, grave type, offerings, etc.) and bioanthropological data (number of dead, sex, age, pathologies, etc.), we will first define the main characteristics of mass burials. We will then question how to discriminate between mass burials linked to war, epidemics, massacres and famine, underlining the major importance of historical sources in this process. The second part is dedicated to the study of various cases from Athens, Paros, Chaeronea, Tanagra and Greek Sicily and their interpretation. We will argue that epidemic mass burials are the most difficult to identify, since they may present innumerable variations in terms of osteoprofiles and archaeological features. Finally, we will question our abilities, as archaeoanthropologists, to evaluate the impact of epidemics on the funerary treatment of the dead in the Ancient world.

The United States Revolutionary War (1775–1783) resulted in numerous mass burials in the eastern United States, with deaths occurring not just directly related to the battles fought, but also from disease, starvation, and exposure. Current information relating to these mass burials is often gathered from myths and rumors, leaving the truth of the historical aspects of that time period ambiguous. Geophysical techniques are increasingly utilized in archaeologic and forensic studies to locate unmarked burials. GPR, magnetics, and electrical resistivity have been used to successfully identify burial locations around the world in a non-invasive manner. This paper aims to illustrate how different burials of the US Revolutionary War period can be detected and characterized with geophysics, providing important knowledge of a better historical understanding of that time period, as well as optimizing equipment instrumentation and processing procedures for such targeted investigations. Three case studies of Revolutionary War Era mass burial sites in Pennsylvania, USA are described here: the Paoli Battlefield Memorial, the Old Charlestown Cemetery, and Saint Peter's Church in the Great Valley. These sites are within 9 km of each other and have historic records that suggest mass burials during this period. Results show GPR to provide the most useful data overall, with supporting information gathered from the supplemental geophysical techniques of magnetometry and resistivity. 2D profiles tend to provide a more valuable image of the subsurface than 3D slices. Larger burials leave a greater footprint and have a higher chance of causing a geophysical disturbance that can be measured more than 200 years after the burial. Soil moisture content and vegetation type can impact quality of results. Study implications demonstrate the challenges and potential usefulness of geophysical techniques to successfully locate and characterize mass burials of this time period.

King George V Memorial Park in Sai Ying Pun, Hong Kong, long rumoured to be haunted, sits atop a mass grave from the Japanese occupation (25 December 1941- 30 August 1945). This paper locates and interprets the mass grave at the Park, where the site was obscured by urban development and excavation is infeasible, by joining historical research methods, digital spatial humanities, and geospatial technologies. Combining archival study, oral history, georeferenced wartime aerial photographs, and Ground-Penetrating Radar (GPR), the study locates a burial pit in a mass grave that contained at least 2,632 bodies, according to post-war exhumation records. By mapping the spatial and social context, this paper also argues that the site reveals the spatial inequality experienced by the urban poor during the Japanese invasion and occupation. This paper offers an example of investigating dark heritage sites across Asia, where post-war urbanisation has obscured civilian wartime suffering.

The twenty-first century is a time of increased uncertainty over the future of sites associated with the Holocaust. As “sites of memory” and “sites of conscience,” they are part of an ongoing debate as to their contentious place within international heritage conventions (UNESCO 2023). Further, while much attention has been paid to the specific challenges of managing Holocaust heritage in the context of the imminent passing of the last of the Holocaust survivors (Pearce 2020; Gilmore and Magee 2018), and the rise in Holocaust denial and distortion (Bauer 2020), the challenges posed by anthropogenic climate change raise yet more uncertainties. Holocaust heritage—along with other heritage places—faces accelerated decay and destruction brought on by the climate emergency, including extreme weather events. Across Europe, examples include the former camp of Fossoli (Italy), already fragile following an earthquake; the collapse of a wall at the former camp of Sachsenhausen (Germany); and the ongoing ruin of the Dresden Barracks in the former ghetto of Terezin (Czech Republic), after a series of storms. Other sites are threatened by rising sea levels—for example, the mass graves and former cemetery in Alderney in the Channel Islands. However, the usual options in the face of destruction of the historical record, which include either expensive preservation and restoration programs or a form of “curated decay” (DeSilvey 2017), are particularly problematic given the complexities of Holocaust sites because of the specific histories and stakeholders. While preservation and restoration are often beyond the financial reach of most Holocaust sites, “curated decay” raises questions about the retention of historic fabric which, as well as being protected under various forms of heritage legislation, is understood as part of the evidence of genocide. Therefore, the concurrent anxieties over the passing of the survivor generation, the rise of Holocaust denial and distortion, and the challenges of climate change create uncertainties for heritage professionals and site managers as to how to best manage the safeguarding of these unique sites. Using the former camp at Fossoli in Italy and the former ghetto of Terezin as case studies, this paper critically examines ideas of loss and uncertainty within heritage practice to explore the lessons for safeguarding Holocaust heritage in the Anthropocene.

Bosnia Hercegovina is the site of a striking number of World War II monuments erected on or near mass graves. Unlike war monuments and war graves elsewhere in Europe, these memorials are bones of contention and they generate violent inter-ethnic animosity. This article describes the trials and tribulations surrounding one of these war monuments and the Serb and Croat communities involved. It addresses an aspect of ethnic cleansing that has hitherto been the focus of very little research, that is, the destruction of mass graves. It is hypothesized that mass graves and the related commemorative ceremonies are a key to understanding the stagnating ethnic identification and the recent revival of violence in rural Bosnia Hercegovina. The article advocates a more systematic inquiry into the local sources of the war in this part of the former Yugoslavia.

The article analyses good faith as a legal criterion in negotiations on licences for standard essential patents (SEPs) on FRAND (fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory) terms. The relevance of the topic follows from the transnational nature of technical standards: standards are developed within international and regional standardisation environments, while SEP holders’ FRAND undertakings arise from the policies of standard-setting organisations and affect access to technology in global markets. The study aims to identify how the courts of England and Wales (2024–2025) assess good faith in FRAND negotiations and how this concept is used when courts address typical cross-border features of SEP disputes: parallel proceedings in multiple states, risks of procedural abuse, and the use of injunction threats as negotiation leverage. The methodology combines formal legal analysis with case studies based on Panasonic v Xiaomi (EWCA Civ, 2024), Samsung v ZTE (EWHC Patents, 2025), Tesla v InterDigital (Court of Appeal, 2025), and related context on global FRAND licences. It also clarifies how English courts translate the ETSI undertaking into an operational legal test for negotiation conduct and for the assessment of procedural behaviour in parallel proceedings. The article shows that good faith is treated as part of the performance of the ETSI undertaking; the courts proceed from the ETSI IPR Policy as the source of the FRAND undertaking and emphasise that good faith is fact-sensitive and must be assessed in light of the parties’ actual conduct. The analysis demonstrates that courts do not limit good-faith assessment to correspondence; they also examine procedural steps and their impact on the cross-border dispute, particularly in situations of competing fora. The findings are relevant for international legal analysis of technology licensing in the digital economy and for understanding how private ordering in standardisation interacts with national judicial remedies, and may inform comparative debate in jurisdictions developing SEP enforcement frameworks. The conclusions are of practical value for litigants and counsel.

This chapter uses corporate law as a case study to evaluate the content of the fiduciary duty of good faith. Tracing its development from Van Gorkom through to the present, the chapter shows how good faith, though part of the duty of loyalty, has become a gap filler, policing the space between generally exculpated breaches of care and the more obvious breaches of loyalty. This chapter also surveys good faith case law to show the most common “red flags” for which corporate officers and directors should be monitoring. An analysis of two of the most recent good faith cases—City of Birmingham and In re Wells Fargo—show how the theory of publicness can be used to predict future good faith developments. Finally, the chapter ends by showing that the duty of good faith’s expansion into trust law parallels its corporate development by emphasizing its gap-filler function.

It was at a meeting held at the University of Trento in June 1994 that Reinhard Zimmermann suggested that good faith in contracts might make an interesting and fruitful topic for the so-called 'Common Core of European Private Law' project.' Six years later, with the publication of Good Faith in European Contract Law,2 Zimmermann's suggestion has been brought through to a successful completion. Whether one's interest is in comparative law or its methodology, the harmonisation of European private law, or good faith in contracts, the publication of this book is a major event and, whatever one makes of the product of this study, there is no question that Zimmermann, his co-editor Simon Whittaker, and the team of contributors are to be congratulated for conceiving of such a book and then delivering it so impressively. The book is a mine of informed analysis. Readers who want an introduction to good faith doctrines in German, French and (in its limited way) English contract law, will be considerably assisted by the co-editors' own opening contribution to the book. Similarly, if one's interest in good faith relates to its place in Roman law, or in contract law in the medieval ius commune, or in US contract law, then the contributions by, respectively, Martin Josef Schermaier, James Gordley, and Robert Summers will be required reading. However, the centrepiece of this book its distinctive contribution to comparative private law scholarship in general and to an understanding of good faith doctrines (or their cognates) in particular is the set of 30 case studies, discussion of which takes up the greater part of this volume. The purpose of the study, focused on the 30 hypothetical cases, is not so much to compare doctrinal technique and resource in contract law regimes across Europe; rather, the project is designed to reach beyond surface doctrinal difference to see how far there is a core of agreement as to good faith outcomes in Europe.

Holocaust mass grave sites in eastern Europe can be difficult to investigate due to a paucity of historical documentation relating to the events and because the use of traditional invasive archaeology methods raises concerns around the disturbance of the remains of Jewish people. When combined with other lines of evidence, including historic photos and eyewitness testimony, noninvasive geophysical methods help to effectively identify and demarcate buried features at Holocaust sites, limiting unnecessary excavations. Between 1941 and 1944, as many as 100,000 people were murdered at the Ponary (Paneriai) extermination site in Lithuania, but many critical details of the site layout during this period are still to be resolved, including the location of some of the mass graves and confirmation of an escape tunnel that was used by slave laborers to escape captivity and certain death at the site. At Ponary, a combination of electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) profiling, limited ground-penetrating radar data, and bare-earth elevation data (from a light and distance ranging data set) was used to confirm the location of a large unmarked mass grave with a diameter of approximately 25 m and depth of approximately 4 m. Additional ERT profiling at a second location imaged the entrance to an escape tunnel previously uncovered by an archaeological excavation in 2004, and it detected an approximately 5 m section of the continuation of the tunnel, approximately 33 m away from the tunnel entrance. The geophysical results are supported by evidence from limited archaeological excavations, historical photographs, eyewitness descriptions of the site layout, and testimonies from the few survivors who managed to escape Ponary.

The excavation of mass graves provides information and documentation for both human rights work and for forensic medico-legal investigations. Medico-legal documentation for the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda is a major reason for recent excavation of large mass graves in these countries. The mass grave excavations have been among the largest since World War II. The investigative teams incorporated professional archaeologists sensitized to medico-legal realities, to the realm of decomposed fleshed remains, and who exhibited flexibility in adapting techniques to the forensic context. This paper examines the forensic context of these excavations, the techniques the team developed, and presents a case study from Rwanda.

This article will contribute to the existing debates on heritage diplomacy. It will build on an understanding of heritage diplomacy through the lenses of decolonial thinking. The core case study is one of the main policy programmes for culture at the European level, the European Capital of Culture, which contributes to the building of a shared European Heritage. Whereas the opportunities for diplomacy work afforded by the programme itself will be considered, the analysis will mainly focus on the representation of colonial heritage in ECoC programmes. The article draws on work conducted in the EU-funded ECHOES project (European Colonial Heritage Modalities in Entangled Cities). The analysis presented will query why dissonant heritage, such as that of a colonial nature, is often left out of discussions of European heritage more generally. Lessons will be drawn on what the implications might be for advancing European heritage diplomacy and cultural policy.

This paper will try to approach the “strategic” role of the concept of good faith in contracts. Even though there are numerous attempts to discover the “tactical” value of this concept by describing all its meanings in the field of contracts, we must take a broader view and see the essential role of good faith in this area of private law. We will only discuss good faith as the equivalent of the German notion of “Treu und Glauben” , meaning good faith and fair dealing, and we will not try to approach the meaning of good faith as an erroneous belief, the equivalent to the German “guter Glaube”. We will also discuss the different approaches to this “objective” good faith, taken by different continental private law systems mainly from Germany, France and Romania, starting from very similar statutory provisions. We will conclude with a case study about the doctrine of frustration of contract as a possible application of the broader principle of objective good faith.

The doctrinal discussion of good faith in the context of a developing concept in Australian contract law was discussed in the earlier chapter. However, the doctrinal discussion offered only a limited view of the concept of good faith in Australian contract law. For this purpose, an empirical overview of good faith is provided to supplement the doctrinal discussion of good faith. A more detailed review of the ‘landscape’ of decided cases on the issue of good faith in contractual performance during the period of review is presented, with tables and graphs to aid in the understanding of the discussion. It includes the empirical data on good faith as an issue in Australian contract law, good faith identified as an implied term in Australian contract cases, breaches of implied term of good faith in Australian contract cases and the judicial attitude for good faith in Australian contract law.