The Intergenerational Transmission of Holocaust Trauma: A Psychoanalytic Theory Revisited

by Robin Gomolin, PsyaD

Author’s Abstract

In this paper, I revisit the theory of an intergenerational transmission of Holocaust trauma. The theory argues that psychological symptoms and ego impairments observed in Holocaust survivors’ children are unique: a consequence of a vicarious exposure to their parents’ traumatic experiences. Using qualitative and quantitative research methods, I reviewed fifty-five case descriptions of children of Holocaust survivors. Though many decades have passed since the inception of this theory, the psychoanalytic literature continues to discuss the ongoing psychological difficulties of survivors and their offspring. I posit that the discourse of trauma that emerged in the wake of the analyses of the children of Holocaust survivors also reflects external factors and unconscious vicissitudes related to the sharing of a “chosen trauma.” I liken the creation of the theory about the Holocaust survivors’ children to the construction of a monument. Within that monument the anxieties, projections, and theoretical and political ideologies, as well as the unconscious experiences, of theorists are contained.

Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 88(3), 461-500, July 2019.

Link to Online Publication. Fulltext can be requested from the library.


Previous Posts:

Anna Ornstein, MD (2020). Mourning. In The Handbook of Psychoanalytic Holocaust Studies: International Perspectives, edited Ira Brenner. Routledge, 2019, p. 74-80.

Randall H. Paulsen, MD (2019). Scientific Theory on the Couch: A Response to Scott C. Taylor. American Imago, 76(3), 405-411.

Bernard Edelstein, MD (2019). Introduction: Stumbling on our Past, Reflections on James Baldwin’s “My Dungeon Shook”. American Imago, 76(3): 295-300.

Don Lipsitt, MD (2020). Is Today’s 21st Century Burnout 19th Century’s Neurasthenia? The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 207(9): 773-777, September 2019.

Elsa Ronningstam, PhD (2020). Internal Processing in Patients with Pathological Narcissism or Narcissistic Personality Disorder: Implications for Alliance Building and Therapeutic Strategies. Journal of Personality Disorders, 34 (Suppl): 80-103.

Dan Jacobs (2019). Three’s a Crowd: Stella’s Pregnancy and the Arrival of an “Other” in A Streetcar Named Desire. International Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies. 16:3, 174– 180.

Fred Busch (2020). The Clinical Significance and Problems of a Traumaticentric ViewIn Trauma and the Destructive-Transformative Struggle: Clinical Perspectives, edited by Terrence McBride and Maureen Murphy. Routledge, p. 187-194.

Jeremy P. Nahum (2019). Louis Sander: Remembrances and Reflections on His Contributions.

James M. Herzog (2019). “Polarity, Paradox and the Organizing Process in Development”; Parent-Infant Psychotherapy and Child Analytic Technique: In Honor of Louis Sander. Psychoanalytic Inquiry, 39:1, 98-108.

Lora Heims Tessman, PhD (2019). Momentums of Meeting. Psychoanalytic Inquiry, 39 (1): 88-97.

Jane Hanenberg, EdD (2019). Review of the book Demons in the Consulting Room: Echoes of Genocide, Slavery and Extreme Trauma in Psychoanalytic Practice ed. by Adrienne Harris, Margery Kalb, and Susan Klebanoff. American Imago 76(2), 274-278.

Paola M. Contreras, PsyD (2019). Working with the Human Trafficking Survivor: What Counselors, Psychologists, Social Workers and Medical Professionals Need to Know. In Working with the Human Trafficking Survivor: What Counselors, Psychologists, Social Workers and Medical Professionals Need to Know, edited by Mary C. Burke. Routledge, pp. 61-80.

Click here to see a full archive of featured papers. All articles can be requested from the library.