Author Description

Egodocuments' is a term coined by the Dutch Jewish historian Jacques Presser in the 1950s. He defined them as "historical sources in which the researcher is faced with an 'I'...as the writing and describing subject with a continuous presence in the text", and demanded their integration into the "acceptable", authoritative array of sources. Seventy years later, historiography in general has embraced his view regarding this type of source material, which sheds light on the emotions, imaginations, perceptions, egos, and characteristics of individuals. Holocaust research has become a leading venue for using, researching, and analyzing egodocuments due to the enormous amount of such sources available concerning this event.00This volume comprises contributions presented in a symposium dedicated to "Egodocuments In Dutch Jewish History", convened by the Center for Research on Dutch Jewry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in December 2017. They stretch from fascinating documents that give voice to eighteenth-century Jewish crooks, to puzzling twenty-first century writings of Jews as well as of non-Jews who present themselves as Jews with a special emphasis on Holocaust-related egodocuments.