Dehumanization In Night By Elie Wiesel

Throughout the book Night by Elie Wiesel, we see many examples of how Jewish people were treated during their time in concentration camps. While reading this book we are met with many examples of the different hardships that Elie had gone through. Some of the hardships they endured were being beaten, tortured, starved, and in all dehumanized. Many examples are shown in the book written by Elie Wiesel. While reading Night we are met with many examples of the dehumanization that Elie was met with.

Throughout the novel Night and throughout the history of the holocaust, Nazis dehumanized Jewish prisoners with both language and actions. Nazis treated Jewish prisoners like animals; when they behaved well, they were rewarded with extra soup or bread and when they misbehaved, they were physically tortured or even killed. They were also referred to as numbers rather than names. This is shown when Elie Wiesel states, “I never felt anything except the lashes of the whip... Only the first really hurt,” (Wiesel 57).

Throughout the story “Night”, there are many ways and examples of man’s inhumanity to man. Elie and many other jews first experienced this when they were forced out of their homes to the concentration camp. Elie and other inmates witnessed violent actions daily at the concentration camps, from soldiers beating inmates and inmates fighting other inmates.  Experiencing these actions affected Elie and other people in the concentration camps.

The book Night by Elie Wiesel offers a harrowing account of the atrocities that were inflicted on Jews during the Holocaust. The Jews were subjected to inhumane treatment, such as being forcefully deported to concentration camps, starved, worked until exhaustion, and routinely beaten, among other forms of cruelty. The brutalization of Jews reached its peak with their systematic extermination in gas chambers and crematoria. These events offer insight into the dehumanization of Jews under Nazi rule. The book offers a reminder of the horrors of the Holocaust and the need to prevent such tragedies from occurring in the future Jews were subjected to inhumane treatment in concentration camps during the Holocaust.

After reading more of Elie Wiesel’s haunting life story, he describes the horrendous things he witnessed while in the concentration camp and, how the prisoners were treated in the most gruesome ways. When they first get to Auschwitz, the Jews are given a number then doctors use needles to brand it onto each captive’s forearm. From then on the prisoners were not known by name but, by their number. This was just one of the degrading things that the Jews were forced to endure. Another hardship they faced was the verbal and physical abuse not only from the guards but, from the other prisoners as well.

The terrifying encounters and portrayal of genocide, witnessed and experienced, during the holocaust were traumatizing and life changing. The Jewish prisoners, in the memoir, “Night” written by Eliezer Wiesel, were treated more like filthy animals than the human beings they were. The concentration camps were just a birthplace for a series of hellish physical and mental torture, as well as constant dehumanization. Eliezer Wiesel and his father experienced agonizing and disturbing dehumanization including, starvation, numerous beatings, unforgettable sights, and overall phychological torture. When Elie and his father first arrived in Auschwitzs, the SS soldiers took their belongings, clothes, and shaved their heads, “Their clippers

Dehumanization in Night “Bread, soup- these were my whole life. I was a body. Perhaps less than even: a starved stomach. The stomach alone was aware of the passage of time” (64). In the novel Night by Elie Wiesel explains the torture the Jews had to go through.

When Eliezer first enters the camp as a prisoner, they force the Jews to strip off their clothing and stand naked in the room, trembling and terrified. During this process Eliezer says, “Our clothes were thrown on the floor at the back of the barrack. For us it meant true equality; nakedness.” (Wiesel 35). Being forced to stand naked in a room full of other prisoners, who are also unclothed, makes the Jewish people feel non-human or animal-like as clothes are part of people’s comfort and identity and without them one can feel alone, scared and vulnerable.

in the autobiography, Night by Elie Wiesel explains the dehumanization of his family, his fellow Jews throughout World War II, and himself. Wiesel also describes how the people all through the autobiography change from civilized humans to vicious beings with animal like behavior. The process of dehumanization starts when Eliezer and the rest of the Jewish community are evacuated from their homes in Sighet, then through the harsh treatments the Jews receive in the concentration camps, and finally when the Jews begin to turn against each other trying to survive the move from one camp to the other towards the ending of World War II. The following signifies how the Jews were not treated as humans. At one point in the autobiography, they were forced

Kate Johnson Ms. Nikolai ELA English 10 Sophomore Academy 02-01-23 Dehumanization Night by Elie Wiesel is a memoir that recounts witnesses to his experiences in multiple concentration camps during the Holocaust. Many people were kept in concentration camps for years during World War II, and while they faced many hardships and fought many battles, possibly the hardest challenge to overcome was that of dehumanization. Dehumanization is the act of regarding, representing, or treating a person or group as less than human, (dictionary.com). During his experiences, Elie witnessed many instances where he, his family, or other Jews in the camps were treated so inhumanely that they felt reduced to little more than ‘things’. The Nazis were harsh, cruel,

Elie’s acts of dehumanization included, Elie witnessing babies being killed, Elie being starved, and Elie being Seperated from his family. First, In the memoir Night, the narrator Elie Wiesel

Throughout Night by Elie Wiesel, dehumanization is a recurring theme, as the Jewish victims are stripped of their basic human rights and treated as less than human. This essay will analyze the process of dehumanization that took place in Auschwitz as it is depicted in Night. Elie Wiesel demonstrates this process by depicting the suppression of victims' individuality upon arriving at Auschwitz, then by highlighting their eventual lack of humanity. Part of what makes humans human is our individuality, our ability to distinguish and express ourselves. When someone loses that individuality, he begins to lose his sense of his own humanity.

Throughout Night, dehumanization consistently took place as the tyrant Nazis oppressed the Jewish citizens. The Nazis targeted the Jews' humanity, and slowly dissolved their feeling of being human. The feeling of dehumanization was very common between the jews. They were constantly being treated as in they were animals. The author and narrator Elie Wiesel, personally experienced being treated like an animal

Dehumanization In the novel, Night, Elie Wiesel tells his story of his survival throughout the horrible event of the Holocaust, where inhumane treatment of Jews shattered their faith in humanity and hope. The Jews were stripped of their nature and were treated like meaningless humans, their purpose and existence meaning nothing to the Nazis as they were seen as nothing but a nuisance. Ridden of their names, soon known as numbers, and having to have seen the atrocities these Jews were exposed to was unreasonable and horrid treatment. Because of this extreme dehumanization that occurred during this time, it serves today as a way to remember those whose lives were taken and to impact society on how such behavior against harmless people can devastate

On the subject of this, the first experience of dehumanization Wiesel experienced was when he and his family were forced into wagons packed with other innocent jews and he says, “After two days of travel, thirst became intolerable, as did the heat” (Wiesel 23). For two days, eighty jews were packed together like sardines on train wagons with no food or water. This horrified me on how the Nazis treated them like prisoners guilty of crimes that justified their own actions against the Jews. The three stages of dehumanization, which is mental, physical, and emotional, were represented throughout the memoir. Mental dehumanization was the stage in which saddened me the most.