“No Sensible Comparison”? The Place of the Holocaust in Australia's History Wars

In Australia's recent History Wars the fate of Australian Aborigines after settlement has frequently been compared and contrasted with that of the Jews during the Holocaust. Such explicit comparisons challenge the widespread critique of transnational Holocaust remembrance as a screen memory—a way to avoid acknowledging traumatic local history. These explicit comparisons require a different conceptual vocabulary—terms such as disavowal and partial remembrance can, properly understood, capture more. Those who insist only on the contrasts between colonial settlement and the Holocaust do so to disavow the very idea of an Australian genocide and protect a fragile sense of national identity. But those who do acknowledge genocide overlook its most serious implication: legal responsibility.