Holocaust History in Germany & Poland

History

Location
Berlin, Germany
Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp, Poland

Description
In the first part of the course, students will get a general introduction into the racist ideology of Nazism and the political structures of national Socialist rule in Germany.

The second part will deal with the Nazi concentration camps, the regime's centers of persecution and terror. Students shall get an idea that the concentration camp system of unlimited terror was established to prosecute political resistance and racial minorities in Germany and its occupied territories. They will learn that concentration camp inmates were denied all the basics of justice and humane treatment. A historical overview about the extension of the concentration camps under the rising terror of Nazism will show that the concentration camps' purpose gradually changed from the persecution of anti-Nazi resistance to the full-fledged persecution and annihilation of social outcasts (gays, Jehovas Witnesses and so-called "anti-social elements"), anti-Nazi resisters from German-occupied countries and ethnic minorities (Jews and Gypsies). The concentration camps, which had originally been designed as institutions of terror and punishment, were subsequently turned into the centers of the Holocaust against the Jewish people in Europe.

The third part of the course deals with the remembrance of the Nazi dictatorship, the Holocaust and concentration camp memorial sites. Former concentration camps in Germany and Poland have been turned into centers of historical learning, mourning and remembrance. Students will learn about the status of concentration camp memorial sites for remembrance and learning. In addition, students will get an overview about the current culture of memory in the German society and the growing importance of the Holocaust for the historical identity of Germans. Students will get an impression about the technical, the intellectual and the emotional difficulties to represent the seemingly unrepresentable and unimaginable terror. Since the last generation of Holocaust survivors is going to die within the next two decades, future generations will have no opportunity for a dialogue about the first hand account of a Holocaust victim. Therefore, the importance of historical representation in memorial sites like concentration camps and Holocaust Museums will even rise.

This course satisfys a "History" requirement at the University of Pittsburgh.

Germany & Poland

After the German invasion of Poland in September 1939, the SS opened the Concentration Camp Auschwitz to imprison and to destroy the Polish resistance and the Polish elite. In early 1942, the SS opened an extermination camp nearby, close to the village of Birkenau. The Auschwitz-Birkenau camp became the center of the Holocaust in which up to 5000 Jewish deportees a day (and close to two million victims altogether) were killed with poisonous gas.

Students will discuss and contemplate historical and current issues with the help of faculty and staff and the educational workers of our German partner, Action Reconciliation. Students, accompanied by faculty and AR staff will participate in a hands-on service experience that supports existing efforts to maintain the camp. Ample opportunities for active critical reflection are provided. Participants will work on preservation, documentation and archive projects. Together with youth groups from Germany, from other European countries and Israel, students will study and reflect the history of the concentration camp and current forms of exclusion, racism and discrimination.

In Berlin, students will learn about Nazism and the German society, about the planners and perpetrators of the Holocaust, about the past and the present of Jewish life in Berlin and about German resisters against Nazism. Students will get a fair impression of contemporary Germany, of multi-ethnicity, multi-culturalism and life in the reunited capital of a reunited country. We will visit several historical exhibitions, talk with members of the Jewish community and with German students what the past means to them and what to learn from the past for the future (tentative). Last but not least: Berlin offers a lot of opportunities for daytime and evening leisure activities.

Details

Instructor: Christopher Kopper

Course Cost

Credits: 6

Service-Learning Abroad : June 15 - July 7, 2004

Credits Awarded: Credits are awarded for this course through the University of Pittsburgh. This course fulfillsHistory of Modern Germany, 1866-1945 (HIST 1131) for 3 credits and Independent Study in History (HIST 1901) for 3 credits.

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