Soil, Ashes, Commemoration: Processes of Sacralization at the Ravensbrück Former Concentration Camp

Ravensbrück concentration camp, the largest women's concentration camp within the German Reich, served as one of the three major "National Memorials" of East Germany. This article explores how the grounds of the former concentration camp were developed into a memorial and how marking sites like Ravensbrück as hallowed ground created a cognitive matrix that enabled them to be used for commemoration ceremonies while also allowing political associations to hold rallies at their sites. Precisely because the sacred is not an autonomous, self-evident entity or a fundamental category, but a category of meaning, which is able to attain its validity through its apparent lack of connection to current political or social realities, it is important to examine what conflicts are expressed and given a framework through sacralization; which groups or individuals are excluded from public commemoration; and which particular political and social interests are involved in this process.