Documentary Unit: Getting Holocaust Survivors

Getting holocaust survivors was far from easy, and given it's such a sensitive subject, many survivors struggle to talk about it. I phoned and emailed several places, starting with the Holocaust Educational Trust. I had had a talk from one of their survivors during my A-level examinations, which inspired me to get in touch with them. Unfortunately this is a very busy time of the year for them, so they were unable to help us, which is understandable. I got in touch with several places until I eventually came across The Association of Jewish Refugees. I emailed them on the off chance, and they were able to link me with an association called Jewish Care. I phone up and spoke to the Service Manager Aviva Trup, who was very obliging. I explained the project and she was able to not hook us up with one survivor, but a group of three. This will hopefully work in our projects favour, where we can get our presenter to show the survivors the #holocaustmemorial search on Instagam.


Aviva took a great interest in our project. The fact that she did offer us three survivors means we can get more opinions increasing the reliability and provenance of our documentary. I came up with some interview questions for the survivors then checked them over with the rest of the group. They all seemed happy with these questions, and when we agreed I sent them directly to Aviva email address. We decided that we wanted to show them the selfies we found then searching #holocaustmemorial on social media, and to talk to them about whether or not our generation has become numb to the Holocaust and if they have ever seen young people being disrespectful. After sending Aviva the suggested questions I asked if we could film as early, as we would soon be filming in Berlin. Since their opinion would be good to have to go throughout the documentary, it would be important to speak to them first to see if they do have a problem.

I was a little concerned when I didn't receive such a quick response as before, but it turns out the offices were closed for Jewish holiday. Aviva responded to my email, and suggested some slight alterations as follows:

Your questions are ok but need a level of warming up and sensitivity
I have put suggestions and a running order to help the flow (see below)
What is missing is a short intro to what you are trying to achieve for the members to know what they will be talking about.
Next Wednesday

I would ask you to think as a team really carefully about how your questions will give you answers to your required outcome? It needs to read as a story/testimony balanced with some positive aspects or else you and they will be feeling pretty awful.
1. Set the scene- we are making a short film to…… This film will be used to show people why holocaust remembrance matters today.(or something similar)
2. We would like to ask you some questions about your life in the war? Is that ok? If there are any questions that you do not feel comfortable answering or would like me to re-phrase them please do stop me
3. We have allocated … minutes but you can take longer if needed
4. We may have to edit some of the film so not everything will be in the final version
5. Can they have a copy of the final version?
6. You will need to get a permission to use form signed by each participant so you can distribute(ask a tutor to assist if you don’t have one)
7. You also need to get ethics clearance from your ethics committee/tutor which I need to see.
Also useful to have a thank you slip with your teams contact emails if survivors wish to contact you as sometimes they ask to do this.

George I need all the names of the people coming for reception.
What time do you think you will get to Hendon on 26th?
You can use my office for filming

Regards
Aviva

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