The Holocaust
Fall 2008
In this course we study the encounter between the Third Reich and Europe’s Jews between 1933 and 1945. This encounter resulted in the deaths of almost 6 million Jews. The course aims to clarify basic facts and explore competing explanations for the origins and unfolding of the Holocaust – in Hebrew, Shoah. We also explore the fate of persecuted non-Jewish groups under Nazism, survivors’ memories after the Holocaust, postwar trials, and the universal implications of the Holocaust. Finally, we ask how we today can try to process the Holocaust.
This course is intended to acquaint students with the historical study of the Holocaust and assumes no prior training in the subject. Class meetings will combine lecture and discussion. Course requirements include three written assignments and conscientious participation in class discussion.
Reading assignments will be drawn from both the primary and secondary literature in the field. Books used for the course may include Saul Friedländer, Nazi Germany and the Jews: The Years of Persecution, 1933-1939; Friedländer, The Years of Extermination: Nazi Germany and the Jews, 1939-1945; Christopher R. Browning, Nazi Policy, Jewish Workers, German Killers (2000); Primo Levi, Survival at Auschwitz; and Daniel Mendelsohn, The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million.