The Jews of Lycée Condorcet in Trouble
Type de matériel :
68
In terms of places of Franco-Jewish memory, Lycée Condorcet was badly hit by the anti-Semitism of 1940-1944. This Parisian establishment that since the Second Empire had formed many young men from the Jewish bourgeoisie (the most famous being Proust, Bergson, Aron and Levi-Strauss) and that had many Jewish students in 1940-1941, lost at first five of its teachers, struck down by the October 3, 1940 ruling (Henry Dreyfus Le Foyer, professor of philosophy in khâgne, was the most famous; Jean-Paul Sartre was his indirect successor in 1941-1944). The number of Jewish students decreased constantly: in the fall of 1940, some families did not return to Paris; in the summer of 1942, after the raid on the Vel’ d’Hiv, many moved to the free zone; at the same time, arrests and deportations increased. There were at least two hundred Jewish students in 1939 and, there were only four declared in July 1944. Foreign Jews paid a particularly steep price to Nazi barbarism. This study deals with the reactions of the Jewish students, their fellow students, and the professors and administrator of the lycée to the different stages of this marginalization. Three conclusions stand out: the Jews continued to be among the most brilliant students; their fellow students were able to improvise some demonstrations of solidarity (particularly in June 1942 when the Jewish students had to wear the yellow star); as for the adults’ rather general goodwill, it was rather powerless.
Réseaux sociaux