The narratives of Grossman and Levi are used as applications of the method of the participatory observation, introduced in sociology and anthropology by Malinowski. This method consists in placing the researcher in a social situation, making him interact with the other actors, in order to extract data for analysis.
Grossman’s and Levi’s masterpieces may help to describe the concentration universe, which is – according to
Hannah Arendt – a central characteristics of totalitarianism. Our two “social researchers” (Grossman and
Levi) descend (unwillingly) into the abyss, the concentration camp, ending up being part of the social group
that lived in that situation. Manipulation, violence and alienation are the key factors which determined the
chance of survival or death in the concentration camp.
