Overview
- Description
- Papers of Dr. Emanuel Tanay, consisting of photographs, documents, correspondence, and patient case files, among other materials. Includes material related to the history of Dr. Tanay's family in pre-Holocaust Europe, as well as his own experiences as a Holocaust survivor in displaced persons camps following World War II. A substantial portion of his collection consists of files of patients, chiefly Holocaust survivors, whom he examined in support of their Holocaust-era restitution claims, and in relation to his own research as a psychiatrist on the effects of post-traumatic stress on Holocaust survivors.
- Credit Line
- United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of the Estate of Dr. Emanuel Tanay
- Collection Creator
- Emanuel Tanay
- Biography
-
Dr. Emanuel Tanay (1928-2014), a forensic psychiatrist who became one of the leading researchers in the area of post-traumatic stress syndrome, was born in Wilno, Poland (later Vilnius, Lithuania) in 1928, to a Jewish family. During the invasion and occupation of Poland by the Germans in World War II, Tanay survived using false identification papers that described him as being Roman Catholic, and by taking shelter in a monastery, but other members of his family, including his father, perished. Following the Holocaust, he was determined to study psychiatry as a means of better understanding the minds of its perpetrators, and his subsequent work in forensic psychiatry also led him to testify as an expert witness in thousands of court cases in the United States. However, his work on post-traumatic stress syndrome also led him to urge the American Psychiatric Association to recognize PTSD as a diagnosable medical condition, and to work with hundreds of Holocaust survivors, in order to diagnose and describe their psychiatric trauma for compensation cases that survivors filed with the West German government. Tanay taught psychiatry and law at Wayne State University, in Detroit, Michigan, and lectured widely on the topics of forensic psychiatry, post-traumatic stress, and the Holocaust. His own account of his experiences during the Holocaust, "Passport to Life: Autobiographical Reflections on the Holocaust," was published in 2004. Tanay died in Ann Arbor, Michigan on 5 August 2014.
Physical Details
- Genre/Form
- Photographs. Correspondence.
- Extent
-
18 boxes
1 oversize box
1 folder
1 book enclosure
Rights & Restrictions
- Conditions on Access
- This material can only be accessed in a Museum reading room or other on-campus viewing station. There are no additional access restrictions to this material.
- Conditions on Use
- Material(s) in this collection are protected by copyright and/or related rights, or contain sensitive personal information. Users may not share with a third party material that contains identifiable information of an individual (e.g., names, dates of birth, social security numbers, bank account information from the last 50 years, etc…) until 50 years after the last date in the file. The user is solely responsible for their use of this material.
Keywords & Subjects
- Personal Name
- Tanay, Emanuel.
Administrative Notes
- Holder of Originals
-
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
- Legal Status
- Permanent Collection
- Provenance
- Donated to the USHMM in 2017 by Sandra Tanay.
- Record last modified:
- 2023-02-24 14:31:04
- This page:
- https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn561887
Download & Licensing
- In Copyright and Other Legal Restrictions
- Terms of Use
- This record is not digitized and cannot be downloaded online.
In-Person Research
- Request 7 Days in Advance of Visit
- Plan a Research Visit
-
Request in Shapell Center Reading Room
Bowie, MD
Contact Us
Also in Dr. Emanuel Tanay collection
Papers of Dr. Emanuel Tanay, consisting of photographs, documents, correspondence, audiovisual media, and patient case files, among other materials. Much of the material relates to the history of Dr. Tanay's family in pre-Holocaust Europe, as well as his own experiences as a Holocaust survivor in displaced persons camps following World War II. Also includes case files of patients, chiefly Holocaust survivors, whom he examined in support of their Holocaust-era restitution claims, and in relation to his own research as a psychiatrist on the effects of post-traumatic stress on Holocaust survivors.
Oral history interview with David Kahan
Oral History
Presentation by Emanuel Tanay to Christian school
Oral History
Oral history interview with Eli Tanen
Oral History
Oral history interview with Gina
Oral History
Oral history interview with Tadek Brezinski
Oral History
Testimony regarding Slomniki/Miechow
Oral History
Oral history interview with Stefan Jagodzinski
Oral History
Dictation regarding the trial of Amon Göth
Oral History
Unknown recording regarding Poland
Oral History