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Crying Hands: Eugenics and Deaf People in Nazi Germany
When the Nazis assumed power in Germany in 1933, they wasted no time in implementing their radical policies, first by securing passage of the Law for the Prevention of Offspring with Hereditary Diseases. Among those designated by this law as “congenitally disabled” were deaf people. Horst Biesold’s newly translated book examines this neglected aspect of Nazi “racial hygiene” through interviews with more than 1,000 deaf survivors of this brutal law that authorized forced sterilizations, abortions, and eventually murder.
Crying Hands meticulously delineates the antecedents of Nazi eugenics, beginning with Social Darwinism (postulated in the mid-nineteenth century) and tracing the various sterilization laws later initiated throughout the world, including many passed and practiced in the United States. This exceptional scholarship is movingly paralleled by the human faces fixed to the numbing statistics, as in story after story those affected recount their irretrievable loss, pain, and misplaced shame imposed upon them by the Nazi regime. Through their stories, told to Biesold in German Sign Language, they have given voice to the countless others who died from the specious science practiced by the Third Reich. And now their own trials have finally been acknowledged.
Crying Hands meticulously delineates the antecedents of Nazi eugenics, beginning with Social Darwinism (postulated in the mid-nineteenth century) and tracing the various sterilization laws later initiated throughout the world, including many passed and practiced in the United States. This exceptional scholarship is movingly paralleled by the human faces fixed to the numbing statistics, as in story after story those affected recount their irretrievable loss, pain, and misplaced shame imposed upon them by the Nazi regime. Through their stories, told to Biesold in German Sign Language, they have given voice to the countless others who died from the specious science practiced by the Third Reich. And now their own trials have finally been acknowledged.
208 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1999
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
October 16, 2023
What minority in Germany was targeted by the Nuremberg Racial Laws as racially impure, considered unworthy of life, legally required to be reported by the citizenry to the authorities, and especially targeted for extermination by gassing and other cruel methods?
If you answered "the Jews," you're both right and wrong.
A little-known aspect of the infamous Nazi racial legislation is that it targeted three specific groups and the last of these groups is usually unheard of in history lessons. They were the Jews, the Roma/"Gypsies", and the disabled. Very few people know that the first people gassed were the disabled, the gas chambers were created for the T4 euthanasia programme, and the first victim was a severely disabled baby. The disabled were subjected to forced sterilisation, starvation, and killed by lethal injection and gassing at medical facilities that doubled as extermination centres, with the aim of ridding the "pure" and "superior" German race of undesirable genetic traits.
One of these collectives amongst the disabled were the Deaf, of which thousands were unwittingly sterilised and murdered. The survivors never got reparations from the German state, unlike the other collectives of victims (this book is from the 90s, so that might've changed since), and there's always been some resistance to recognise the disabled as victims of Nazism. Sometimes I wonder if it has to do with the fact that aborting babies due to inherited disabilities is still acceptable in many places now? Nobody wants to think it's anything similar to what the Nazis proposed, but this reluctance to recognise the Deaf as victims of racially-driven Nazi eugenics that the survivors quoted in this book is certainly going to be very uncomfortable for many.
The book is written in a very matter-of-fact style, dry and unengaging, very academic in style. It has some outdated details as well and hasn't touched on other aspects it should have. But given the scarcity of books on the T4 programme and specifically on the Deaf as victims of Nazism, this is the best we have for now, so it'll have to do. It's informative enough, though you do need some prior historical context to place the experiences described here.
And it's a very sad read overall, too, in spite of its annoying writing flaws. For me that I have a lifelong connection with the Deaf, it got personal. I've read lots of horrific accounts of the Nazi crimes, but when I think of the Deaf people I know that would've been subjected to this inhumanity, it always hits differently. It's enough WWII for me for the rest of the year, I think!
If you answered "the Jews," you're both right and wrong.
A little-known aspect of the infamous Nazi racial legislation is that it targeted three specific groups and the last of these groups is usually unheard of in history lessons. They were the Jews, the Roma/"Gypsies", and the disabled. Very few people know that the first people gassed were the disabled, the gas chambers were created for the T4 euthanasia programme, and the first victim was a severely disabled baby. The disabled were subjected to forced sterilisation, starvation, and killed by lethal injection and gassing at medical facilities that doubled as extermination centres, with the aim of ridding the "pure" and "superior" German race of undesirable genetic traits.
One of these collectives amongst the disabled were the Deaf, of which thousands were unwittingly sterilised and murdered. The survivors never got reparations from the German state, unlike the other collectives of victims (this book is from the 90s, so that might've changed since), and there's always been some resistance to recognise the disabled as victims of Nazism. Sometimes I wonder if it has to do with the fact that aborting babies due to inherited disabilities is still acceptable in many places now? Nobody wants to think it's anything similar to what the Nazis proposed, but this reluctance to recognise the Deaf as victims of racially-driven Nazi eugenics that the survivors quoted in this book is certainly going to be very uncomfortable for many.
The book is written in a very matter-of-fact style, dry and unengaging, very academic in style. It has some outdated details as well and hasn't touched on other aspects it should have. But given the scarcity of books on the T4 programme and specifically on the Deaf as victims of Nazism, this is the best we have for now, so it'll have to do. It's informative enough, though you do need some prior historical context to place the experiences described here.
And it's a very sad read overall, too, in spite of its annoying writing flaws. For me that I have a lifelong connection with the Deaf, it got personal. I've read lots of horrific accounts of the Nazi crimes, but when I think of the Deaf people I know that would've been subjected to this inhumanity, it always hits differently. It's enough WWII for me for the rest of the year, I think!
April 9, 2022
Through a series of interviews, deaf Holocaust survivers revealed the true plight of hundreds of people during the Nazi rule in WW2. This was an eye opening book and I was extremely saddened and moved by the events that occurred during those challenging years.
February 20, 2013
it's a shame the gallaudet editors felt they had to tear apart biesold's original structure. some of the changes are tolerable, such as moving the hard data to appendices, but choosing to leave out the closing discussion of efforts to obtain reparation was a strange decision because it's relevant regardless of nationality and the book now ends very abruptly. (which is not to say that there's an End to this narrative, but still.) ah well - at least they did the courtesy of telling us what changes they made.
despite the changes, this remains a very clear and carefully-navigated picture of something that is more often glossed over. the title says "eugenics", which typically connotes the killing camps, but the bulk of the book is given over to discussing forced sterilization - poorly-done ones at that - which can arguably be more terrible than outright murder because then the victims are essentially tortured for the rest for their life with physical and mental pain both. what i found most interesting was the institutional reluctance, even recently, to help with this study; i would have liked to see more exploration of that, and a clear answer as to why the nazis didn't just close all the schools and have done with it (unless it's simply that they wanted to go for the slow boil) but i suspect that would mean a different book.
all in all a good work that says much in a short space.
despite the changes, this remains a very clear and carefully-navigated picture of something that is more often glossed over. the title says "eugenics", which typically connotes the killing camps, but the bulk of the book is given over to discussing forced sterilization - poorly-done ones at that - which can arguably be more terrible than outright murder because then the victims are essentially tortured for the rest for their life with physical and mental pain both. what i found most interesting was the institutional reluctance, even recently, to help with this study; i would have liked to see more exploration of that, and a clear answer as to why the nazis didn't just close all the schools and have done with it (unless it's simply that they wanted to go for the slow boil) but i suspect that would mean a different book.
all in all a good work that says much in a short space.
March 3, 2018
I'm pretty sure my eyebrows were raised to my hairline throughout this entire read. While we all know about how inexcusably the Jewish were treated during WWII, this book calls to light the treatment of deaf individuals throughout this same time period. I really valued the personal accounts included within the book, and wished for more. Some portions were difficult to get through due to the wording and specific attention towards research.
September 1, 2023
A very hard read, made me cry reading people’s stories.
February 21, 2024
Very heartbreaking to read because many deaf children and adults were murdered because of deafness and some were forced to have sterilized trying to stop deafness spreading.
July 27, 2010
I tried to read this book. My teacher gave extra credit to who ever bought the book and read it, I got bored I couldnt finish.
July 2, 2014
Be prepare to read true story about Deaf people getting abused from the Nazi. I couldn't stop thinking about those poor deaf souls.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews