Towards a social psychology of extreme situations: Primo Levi's If This isa Man and social identity theory

The present study deals with social relationships in the extreme situation of the concentration camp, using Primo Levi's If This Is a Man, written jus t after the author's release front Auschwitz. This text was chosen because it is one of the most important testimonies of the Holocaust and at the sam e time, a work of great artistic value. An analysis of the behaviour descri bed gives us access to otherwise irretrievable data. Three aims hale been p ursued: (1) to explore and describe interpersonal and intergroup behaviour in extreme situations from the victims' perspective, (2) to analyse these t ypes of behaviour through social identity theory (SIT), and (3) to highligh t certain observations and comments by Levi, an excellent 'privileged obser ver', which might suggest new directions of research in this field. Turning our attention to interpersonal and intergroup relations, we submitted the text to content analysis. Correspondence analysis was then carried out. The results support the importance of Tajfel's (1981) theory for the analysis of extreme situations, but also suggest possible extensions of the present model following Levi's theorizing. Copyright (C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Lt d.