The Dehumanization of Jews Dehumanization is the process by which the Nazis gradually reduced the Jews to little more than things. In Night By, Elie Wiesel, Eliezer, his father, and the other Jews were dehumanized over time to they became nothing to the SS officers. In the first part of Night Moshe the Beadle was thrown onto the first load of cattle cars and sent off. ( Night pg. 6) “They stopped the cattle car that Moshe was on, and the officers made the Jews dig a big trench and then the shot and killed them.
The genocide of the Jews was a culminaion of a decade of German police. The Jews were dehumanized in many different ways. One way they were dehumanized was by the Hungarian police and they were yelling “Faster, Faster! Move, you lazy good- for nothing!”
There were multiple accounts of dehumanization of the Jews in Night by Elie Wiesel, and the vast majority of it came from the Nazis. The most basic of human rights were deprived of the Jewish people throughout all of Night. Jews in the book were not being treated humanely at all; the Nazis treated the Jews like they were animals. For example, in Night it was mentioned that the Jews were given tattoos to identify them, which is just how a farmer would treat cattle. The Jews also has little to no rights what so ever while being in captivity by the Nazis. "
Loss of Faith and Dehumanization in Night The word holocaust originates from the Latin words from ‘holos’ meaning whole and ‘kaustos’ meaning burned. The name holocaust was rightfully given to Hitler’s Final Solution plan which called for the extermination of more than six million Jews. In 1933 the plan was put into action and forced millions of Jews, gypsies, and others into concentration camps. Eli Wiesel, holocaust survivor and Noble Peace Prize winner, shares horrific experiences of his time spent in concentration camps.
Weisell explains what life was like in a concentration camp; “ Hunger- thirst- fear- transport- selection- fire- chimney: these words all have intrinsic meaning, but in those times they meant something else (Weisellix).” The Jews were treated not as humans because they were not viewed as such in the eyes of the Nazi’s.
You see it at the zoo, you see it at shelters, you see wild animals in a cage, which thoroughly describes how the Jewish community was treated at the time of the treacherous period known as the Holocaust, which started in 1939. The Holocaust was a period when the Nazi party and Hitler put millions of Jewish people in concentration camps, where they would then die or work until death. However, they were treated with dehumanizing qualities, similar to how a wild animal would be treated. In the novel Night by Elie Wiesel, the Schutzstaffel or the SS officers, treated Elie, the main character, and the Jewish prisoners in a dehumanizing way by taking their belongings away, giving them commands like wild dogs, and calling and tattooing them with
The terrifying encounters and portrayal of genocide, witnessed and experienced, during the holocaust were traumatizing and life changing. The Jewish prisoners, in the memoir, “Night” written by Eliezer Wiesel, were treated more like filthy animals than the human beings they were. The concentration camps were just a birthplace for a series of hellish physical and mental torture, as well as constant dehumanization. Eliezer Wiesel and his father experienced agonizing and disturbing dehumanization including, starvation, numerous beatings, unforgettable sights, and overall phychological torture. When Elie and his father first arrived in Auschwitzs, the SS soldiers took their belongings, clothes, and shaved their heads, “Their clippers
Elie Wiesel’s novel, Night, is a memoir that describes the horrific experiences of both Elie and other Jews. Elie’s journey is largely about a loss of innocence, faith, and family. Elie Wiesel’s purpose in ending his memoir by describing what he saw as he looked at himself in the mirror was to demonstrate how he was emotionally dead from his experiences. To begin with, Wiesel’s emotional death was created by the dehumanization he and other Jews experienced. Perhaps, the scene that most reveals the dehumanization of Wiesel and his fellow Jews was a scene where a starved man kills his father for a piece of bread.
The barbarism displayed towards Jewish people in concentration camps is evidently present in Elie Wiesel ’s memoir Night: one wrong move, one failed selection, one sign of humanity, and they have a one-way trip to the crematorium. The novel Night is a testimony about the author, Elie Wiesel, and his experiences in a concentration camp during the Holocaust. To take a deeper look at the atrocities demonstrated within this novel, one must first understand how the Schutzstaffel (SS) dehumanized the Jews.
Luis Maldonado Ms. Vandevander English 10 5 April 2024 The Effects of Dehumanization What did the Nazis do to the Jews in the Holocaust? In the memoir Night, by Elie Wiesel, he writes about the suffering and hardships he had to deal with in the German concentration camps. At 12 Elie was taken from his home and sent to Auschwitz. Separated from his mother and sister, Elie and his father have to learn how to survive in this treacherous environment.
In the novel Night the protagonist, Elie Wiesel, narrates his experiences as a young Jewish boy surviving the Holocaust. Elie 's autobiographical memoir informs the reader about how the Nazis captured the Jews and enslaved them in concentration camps, where they experienced the absolute worst forms of torture, abuse and inhumane treatment. Dehumanization is shown in the story when the Jews were stripped of their identities and belongings, making them feel worthless as people. From the start of Elie Wiesel 's journey of the death camps, his beliefs of his own religion is fragile as he starts to lose his faith. Lastly, camaraderie is present as people in the camps are all surviving together to stay alive so as a result the people in the camp shine light on other people 's darkness.
Kate Johnson Ms. Nikolai ELA English 10 Sophomore Academy 02-01-23 Dehumanization Night by Elie Wiesel is a memoir that recounts witnesses to his experiences in multiple concentration camps during the Holocaust. Many people were kept in concentration camps for years during World War II, and while they faced many hardships and fought many battles, possibly the hardest challenge to overcome was that of dehumanization. Dehumanization is the act of regarding, representing, or treating a person or group as less than human, (dictionary.com). During his experiences, Elie witnessed many instances where he, his family, or other Jews in the camps were treated so inhumanely that they felt reduced to little more than ‘things’. The Nazis were harsh, cruel,
One of Wiesel 's strengths in Night is to show the full face of dehumanization. It is something that the Nazis perpetrated against the people they imprisoned. The tattooing of numbers on the prisoners, something that Eleizer notes, is of extreme importance. A- 7713 is by definition an example of dehumanization because it robs the humanity of the individual. The abuses that the Nazis perpetrate on their prisoners is another example of dehumanization.
Jonah Wright English II Mrs. M. Scott February 21, 2023 Dehumanization of the Jews in Night Dehumanization is the denial of full humaneness in others and the cruelty and suffering that accompanies it. Throughout the book Night by Elie Wiesel, these accounts of dehumanization, starvation, and deprivation are shown. In the year 1944, The SS Officers transported the people of Sighet to a concentration camp called Auschwitz. There at Auschwitz was a form of punishment for the Jews, they experienced physical and mental torture identity loss and denial of food and water. These cruel treatments led to the dehumanization of the Jews which is exactly what Hitler planned.
In Night one of the ways that the Jews were dehumanized was by abuse. There were beatings, “I never felt anything except the lashes of the whip... Only the first really hurt.” (Wiesel, 57) “They were forced to dig huge trenches. When they had finished their work, the men from the Gestapo began theirs.
