ABSTRACT
The previous chapter brought out something of the complexities involved in the analysis of deportee identities. Gender and sexual identities were seen to be constructed in the specific situation of the camps, and it emerged that differentiation is essential if an accurate picture is to be established: it is not enough to refer to ‘women in the camps’— though many studies do-but ‘French women in the camps’, and in some cases, ‘French women of a certain class in the camps’. Of course (French) national and class identities are also constructs, and ones which will be explored further in this chapter, alongside an additional inflection: that of political affiliation. Although, for the sake of clarity, nationality, class and politics are treated as distinct categories in the following discussion, the extent of their implication in the construction of identity will once again become apparent.
