The French Resistance in World War II through the history of emotions
Channel: War Studies KCL
Date: 2022-12-09

Professor Guillaume Piketty delivers the 2022 Sir Michael Howard Annual Lecture on the intimate secrets and personal memories of resistance fighters.

Since 1944, tens of thousands of articles and books have been written about the French Resistance during the Second World War. Former resisters and historians, French and non-French, took part in this grand enterprise. During the last decades, there has been an enormous outpouring of memories, coupled with lively debates and disputes among academics about this history.  Nevertheless, these discussions have tended to obscure or marginalise our efforts to get closer to the personal experience of the resistance fighters themselves. This is all the more important as the last of these fighters gradually pass away, taking their intimate secrets and personal memories to the grave.

Professor Guillaume Piketty explores how the history of sensitivities and emotions can be used to unearth these secrets by making use of sources such as private writings, photographs, drawings, and personal objects created by resisters.