LGBTQ+ Children of Holocaust Survivors and the Reproductive Imperative: Queering Family and Survival

• In Event: Gender, Sexuality, and the Holocaust, Session 1

Abstract

This paper brings together Edelman's theory of reproductive futurity and queer of colour critique of this theory to examine and unpack how reproduction and the politics of the Child have an impact on the lives of LGBTQ+ children of Holocaust survivors. Drawing up 16 oral history interviews with LGBTQ+ children of survivors, I examine how narrators discussed, recognized, and responded to the reproductive imperative. This paper understands the reproductive imperative as the incredible pressures placed upon children of survivors to get married and have children to ensure the continuation of the Jewish people, to rebuild families lost during the Holocaust, and to ensure that Hitler and the Nazis do not gain a posthumous victory. Of the 16 participants, 5 had children. The remaining 11 discussed alternative and queer forms of survival and understandings of families in response to their not fulfilling the reproductive imperative. I also then examine how those who did have children explain new forms of bonds, family, and intimacy that come about through adopting children. Finally, this paper examines the case study of Participant X who had children but never disclosed this information to their Holocaust survivor father. Overall, this paper examines the queer ways LGBTQ+ children of Holocaust survivors responded, altered, and navigated the reproductive imperative.

Author

• Jacob Evoy, University of Western Ontario