T he idyllic river landscape that opens Claude Lanzmann's Shoah soon becomes scenes in which Szymon Srebrnik guides the filmmakers through the forest in order to finally stand before an empty clearing and say, "Es ist schwer zu erkennen, aber es war hier." [It is difficult to recognize, but it was here.p "Here" is Chełmno/Kulmhof, one of the many sites of genocidal massacres perpetrated be tween Berlin and M oscow that now contain the remains o f the victims.3 Forest clearings, clumps o f trees, grassy 1 This p a p e r is a c co m p a n ie d by e ig h t d ip ty c h s, w h ic h ca n be found in th e la s t 9 p a g e s o f th e in sert, p rep ared fo r th e p u rp o se s o f th is p u b lication by Ja so n F ra n c isco , an a rtist, e s s a y is t , and p h o to g rap h er. Fran cisco 's d ip ty c h s ra ise in visual la n g u a g e q u e s tio n s t h a t th e pres e n t a rticle s e t s fo rw a rd : th e c o n te m p o ra ry m e a n in g o f c o n te ste d , fo rg o tte n m e m o ry s ite s , th e u sa g e o f th e s ite s , ou r p re s e n c e w ith in t h e m , th e h a b ita b le and th e in h ab itab le, th e o rd in ary and th e in conc e iv a b le , th e c o n flic ts o f p a s t and p re s e n t, life and d e a th , th e visible and th e invisible. 2 Shoah, C h a p ter 4, 00:0 7:0 5. 3 Follow in g th e re a so n in g o f T im o th y S n y d e r in Bloodlands: Europe betw een H itler an d Stalin (N ew York: B asic B o o k s, 2010), I p ro p o se exp an d in g th e d isc u ssio n o f "n o n-p la c e s o f m e m o ry " to re fe r n ot only to H o lo c a u st s ite s b u t a lso to th e s ite s o f o th e r g e n o c id e s or o f o th e r fo rm s o f m a s s v io le n c e , and to s ite s re la te d to t h e s e e v e n ts (includ-Roma Sendyka is a director o f the Research C en te r for M em ory C ultures, te a c h e s a t th e C en ter for A n th rop olo gy o f Literature and Cultural S tu d ie s a t th e P olish S tu d ie s D ep artm en t, Jagiellonian University. S h e w as aw ard ed in the P attern s Program (Erste Stiftu n g, V ienna, 20 10-12) for th e p ro je ct "(In)visible Loss. The H o lo cau st and th e Everyday Visual Experience in C on tem po rary Poland and Central Europe" S h e recently publish ed : Prism-Understanding N on-Sites o f Mem ory
