Seminar on Memory Cultures in Difficult Sites

events Programme

The seminar devoted to cultures of memory in sites of difficult heritage was planned by the Zapomniane Foundation as a two-part process aimed at collective reflection on the future form of commemoration of sites where the remains of victims are deposited on the outskirts of the former extermination camp in Sobibor, on the language of description and the narratives accompanying these locations, and on the relationship between research, institutional practice, and the landscape of the site.

The first part of the seminar took place in Warsaw on 16–17 October 2025 as part of the 4th Workshops for Holocaust Researchers at early and mid-career stages. The meeting took the form of an academic seminar and brought together researchers working on the history of the Holocaust, memory studies, and contemporary contexts of violence. It included a session entitled “The dispersal of Jewish human remains in the area of the Sobibor extermination camp: research, protection, and commemoration,” led by the team of the Zapomniane Foundation: Aleksandra Janus, Agnieszka Nieradko-Pająk, and Aleksander Schwarz. The session presented the assumptions of the project commemorating the so-called washing sites, the problem of the dispersal of victims’ remains within the former extermination camp, and issues related to their protection, legal status, and the narrative of future commemoration. The discussion among workshop participants made it possible to gather research experiences and perspectives relevant to further stages of the project.

The second part of the seminar took place on 22 October 2025 in Sobibor, on the grounds of the Museum and Memorial Site and in its immediate surroundings. Participants included representatives of the Zapomniane Foundation and the Formy Wspólne Foundation, the director and staff of the Museum and Memorial Site in Sobibor, representatives of the Sobibór Forest District, local government authorities and the municipal office, a local history teacher, representatives of the Regional Museum in Włodawa, as well as invited academic experts: Raphael Utz, a researcher focusing on conflict archaeology, material traces of violence, and methodologies for studying extermination sites and mass graves, and Natalia Judzińska, a researcher and curator whose work focuses on the materiality of crisis, contemporary commemorative practices, and the relationships between Holocaust memory and current social and political phenomena.

A key element of this part of the seminar was fieldwork carried out at locations situated outside the formal boundaries of the museum, on the outskirts of the former Sobibor extermination camp. These are sites where human remains extracted from the camp area were deposited after the war. Seminar participants visited these locations, analysing their position in relation to the current museum infrastructure, their relationship with the forest landscape, and the lack of clear marking and public visibility of these sites.

During the meeting, the Zapomniane Foundation presented the current stage of work on the project commemorating the so-called washing sites, whose aim is to develop preliminary concepts for marking and interpreting these locations, taking into account the results of historical, archaeological, and geophysical research as well as legal and institutional conditions. Discussions focused on possible narrative directions, the scope of intervention in the landscape, the relationship between the museum and the surrounding forest areas, and ways of communicating the significance of these sites to visitors to Sobibor.

The seminar in Sobibor constituted the second stage of the process conducted by the Zapomniane Foundation and was directly linked to the Warsaw part. The combination of academic reflection with fieldwork made it possible to further refine the assumptions of the commemoration project and to organise issues related to language and narrative.

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