The Holocaust has become a central reference point in our political, moral, and cultural life. Reflections on the Nazi genocide of six million European Jews have inspired fierce debates about a wide range of topics: how to compare different kinds of atrocities, what to call them, and how to commemorate them; how to represent unspeakable trauma in courtrooms, in art and literature, in public conversation; how to understand the motives of perpetrators; and how to seek justice for great crimes. The number of historical studies (both popular and highly specialized), documentary films, television programs, and movies about the Holocaust continues to increase every year, a sign that thinking about the Holocaust remains as urgent for many Americans today as it did several decades ago. Indeed, some form of Holocaust education in high schools is now mandatory in many states in this country, including here in New Jersey.
This course is a history of the Holocaust. Our task this semester is three-fold. We will study in detail the places, events, and turning points that comprise the Holocaust as a historical concept, as well as the political, social, and ideological forces that lay behind them. We will also examine the Holocaust from many different perspectives in order to grasp the ways that individuals shaped, responded to, and interacted with those larger forces and events. Finally, we want to reflect on the ways that the Holocaust has been defined and remembered. With this foundation, I hope that we can begin to ask informed questions about the ways that consciousness of the Holocaust affects how we think about persecution and genocide in our own time.
Credit not given for both this course and 01:563:261.
