Detention at Manus Island was not the same as detention at Auschwitz, writes Jordana Silverstein. But the historical insights from those who were in those places echo through time, across generations.
The imperative issued by Levi’s text is not that one should persist in seeing the human in the inhuman. It is more like its opposite: that one bear must witness to the inhuman in the human.
Racism is again on the rise in many parts of the world. So is the dehumanisation of our enemies. What hope is there, then, for notions of a common humanity?