Abstract
Since 2012, the Auschwitz Museum has been conducting a project focused on the individual commemoration of victims of the Holocaust. It publishes several to over a dozen such posts daily across various social media platforms (including the most popular ones: Facebook, Instagram, and X). These posts most often take the form of a short note published on the victim’s birthday, accompanied by a photograph (if available). During an individualized interview with Paweł Sawicki, the coordinator of the project at the Auschwitz Museum, it was revealed that content from these commemorative posts is increasingly being appropriated by various public profiles for purposes that are inconsistent with the original sender’s intent. This information became the inspiration for a research project aimed at identifying the ways in which such content is used by public profiles unaffiliated with the Museum on the Facebook platform. The research findings were obtained through several months of non-participatory, covert netnographic observation, as well as in-depth research aimed at identifying how public, unaffiliated profiles utilize content published by the Auschwitz Museum. The paper outlines three identified models of engagement with the original content: 1. Sharing for commemoration, 2. Modification for enhancement, 3. Confabulation for reach. In the second and third models, the role of AI in processing the original content is discussed. The conclusions address the broader ethical context of this phenomenon and its consequences for the process of commemoration, as well as for historical education and the popularization of historical knowledge.
Presenters
Agnieszka CałekTeacher and Researcher, Institute of Journalism, Media and Social Communication, Jagiellonian University, Malopolskie, Poland
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
2025 Special Focus—From Democratic Aesthetics to Digital Culture
KEYWORDS
Commemoration, AI, Facebook, Social media, Auschwitz Museum
