Étudier l’histoire et la mémoire de la Shoah à travers un film de fiction : La petite prairie aux bouleaux

The Holocaust topic was first addressed as history, then as memory. It is now a school-tailored one. Yet teaching the Holocaust has changed over years, due to new school practices including going to Auschwitz-Birkenau, as well as historiographical changes or the use of witness’s accounts. To what extent does fiction make a sense? The filmmaker is herself a former Birkenau deportee and the character is the alias of Marceline LoridanIvens. As a consequence, studying this film leads to better understanding of Auschwitz-Birkenau history as a place, including the way visitors and witnesses grasp it.