Music Making As Community Formation In Auschwitz-Birkenau: The Case Of Krystyna Żywulska
Document Type
Book Chapter
Publication Date
2025
Published In
The Routledge Handbook To Auschwitz-Birkenau
Abstract
This chapter focuses on the poems and songs written by Krystyna Żywulska in Auschwitz-Birkenau to show how they contributed to the formation of a community around her. Several scholarly studies have noted the role of music in Auschwitz-Birkenau as part of the camp’s system of organised cruelty, but an exclusive focus on this role played by music risks making prisoners appear as simply passive. Żywulska’s writings from within the concentration camp serve as evidence of how at least some prisoners were able to form and reinforce social ties between them, and express a range of emotions.
Published By
Routledge
Editor(s)
S. M. Cuhman, J. Pettitt, and D. Williams
Recommended Citation
Barbara Ann Milewski.
(2025).
"Music Making As Community Formation In Auschwitz-Birkenau: The Case Of Krystyna Żywulska".
The Routledge Handbook To Auschwitz-Birkenau.
153-161.
DOI: 10.4324/9781003262848-17
https://works.swarthmore.edu/fac-music/95