Susan Martin writes about gender, fertility and memory from the perspective of a non-Jewish person walking on the soil where the killing of millions of Jewish people took place. She studies the boundaries between the historical record and the recording of memory in the body as it influences current cultural issues of gender identity. She grew up in North Carolina where she experienced the benefits of the Quaker community and thought.
Growing up in the culture of sociology taught me - and others of my generation - to engage in a set of behaviors to ensure that we would "always be wanted." Although the term "wantedness" was a quality originally assigned to births, the concept began to touch all aspects of children's lives, teaching us to engage in a dangerous - sometimes deadly - dance of perfectionism.
Date posted: 2019-12-06
"Strange as it may sound, the Holocaust education at my school shaped my sexuality and fertility well into adulthood by teaching me that the Holocaust brought about a complete break in the continuity of mankind. In the face of such immense suffering and slaughter, no responsible woman would choose to have children.
Date posted: 2019-07-24