Dr. Emanuel Tanay papers

Identifier
irn561887
Language of Description
English
Alt. Identifiers
  • 2017.246.1
Level of Description
Item
Source
EHRI Partner

Extent and Medium

boxes

oversize box

folder

book enclosure

18

1

1

1

Creator(s)

Biographical History

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.

Archival History

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Acquisition

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of the Estate of Dr. Emanuel Tanay

Donated to the USHMM in 2017 by Sandra Tanay.

Scope and Content

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.

People

Subjects

This description is derived directly from structured data provided to EHRI by a partner institution. This collection holding institution considers this description as an accurate reflection of the archival holdings to which it refers at the moment of data transfer.