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ABSTRACT
The authors identify an unresearched practice of Israeli youth participating in organized Holocaust journeys: at the end of the journey, students write thank you letters in a notebook that is then given to the educational guide. Researchers qualitatively analyzed 20 such notebooks written by Israeli high school students. Using grounded-theory methods for document analysis, we identified the notebooks’ role as a incorporation stage after the journey, which is a pilgrimage-like rite of passage. In the letters, students proclaim their transformation, their attention to the guide, and their desire to be remembered. Thus, the notebooks affirm the journey’s success and allow for their return to Israel having had a transformational experience and inhabiting a new position. This analysis adds to our understanding of the role of ritual, especially document-based rituals, in the world of heritage tourism. We recommend the further study of similar reflective techniques in other heritage tourism contexts and their incorporation by heritage tourism professionals. The study adds to the body of knowledge by recognizing the importance of the personal approval of participants. The individual confirms by his signature the transition to the new status. The study illuminates the importance of written reflections on tourist transformation.
Acknowledgements
This article began as part of an advanced training program at the Mofet Institute. We would like to thank the faculty and students of the program and especially Prof. Naomi Weiner-Levy for guidance and support in the study’s early stages. We would also like to thank the editors and anonymous readers at Journal of Heritage Tourism. We dedicate our work to Alex Dancyg, Holocaust historian and educator, one of the founders of the Israeli youth Holocaust journeys, who was kidnapped by Hamas from his home in Nir-Oz on October 7, 2023. We await his return.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 The practice of writing gratitude notebooks is primarily characteristic of journeys undertaken by the state-general (secular) educational system and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Guides who usually work with schools in the state-religious stream were unfamiliar with these journals. If we may offer a conjecture, religious schools might have less need for civic rituals, because they have religious ones.
2 The instrumentalization of the Holocaust for nationalist education is a recurring critique and is beyond the scope of this article.
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David Hadar
David Hadar, PhD, is a literary scholar with degrees from the Hebrew University, Jerusalem. He is chair of the Department of English Language and Literature at Beit Berl College and also teaches at Kaye College. His work has been published in journals such as Narrative and Studies in American Jewish Literature. His book Affiliated Identities in Jewish American Literature was published in 2020.
Gila Oren
Gila Oren, PhD, is a leading senior lecturer, Head of Marketing Studies, and a faculty member at the Faculty of Business Administration at the College of Management. She holds BA and MA degrees from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a PhD from the Faculty of Management at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (2015). Dr. Oren brings over 20 years of experience in the marketing and advertising industry. Since 2009, she has been leading international groups on the March of the Living journeys to Poland. Her articles have appeared in The Journal of Loss and Trauma, Tourism Management, The Journal of Heritage Tourism and other venues.