ABSTRACT
This chapter utilizes various victim voices to introduce the reader to the scope and arguments of the book. It sets the parameters for the study, discussing the core methodologies of history of emotions and empathic history. It also addresses three important choices that guide the study—sources, places, and language. Especially emphasized here are the values and limitations of diaries as historical sources and the role and importance of Yiddish for Jews living in the Warsaw, Lodz, and Vilna ghettos. It also mentions a few lacunae in the current study (particularly female voices and Polish diaries) and suggests paths for future research in these areas. It frames the book around three major arguments: 1. The quotidian oppression in the ghettos resulted in a prolific, persistent, progressive feeling of persecution that relied on uncertainty for its potency. 2. The encounters diarists had with a multitude of perceived persecutors led to an important form of psychological suffering—a forced reckoning with any positive notions they may have believed about community and humanity before the war. 3. That forced reckoning itself formed an essential site of both suffering and agency, as diarists struggled against internalized dehumanization.
