Perspectives in History: The History of the Holocaust
Svanur Pétursson
[email protected]
Office: Conklin Hall 337
Office Hours: Thursdays: 4-6pm and by appointment
21:510:289
Tuesdays/Thursdays 2:30-3:50
Engelhard Hall 213
Spring 2014
This course is a detailed examination of the programs of persecution and mass murder carried out by the
Nazi German regime between 1933 and 1945. Several themes will be prominent throughout the semester.
First, we will examine and try to understand when and how policies of exclusion can be transformed into a
systematic program of murder. In this regard, we will examine not only the development of Nazi Germany
as a “racial state,” but also the role of ideologies, such as anti-Semitism, nationalism, and racism, in
shaping policies of exclusion in Germany and elsewhere in Europe. Second, we will focus on the place of
the Holocaust in European, and not only German history. The events we associate with the Holocaust took
place across the continent of Europe and were shaped by local histories; throughout the course, we will pay
close attention to the interaction between Germans, Jews, and non-German native populations. Third, we
will try to try to understand how eyewitness memories, historical research, and media representations all
shape our contemporary understanding of what the Holocaust was and why it seems so important to us
today. The mass murder of European Jews will be the central focus of this course. We will, however, also
disucuss programs of discrimination and murder carried out against other groups (e.g. Roma, the disabled,
homosexuals, and Poles) and attempt to place those phenomena within the context of Nazi German racial
policy. Throughout the course we will also consider how subsequent generations commemorated and
portrayed the memory of the Holocaust in both official and popular forms. From documentaries like Night
and Fog, and Shoah, television miniseries like the 1977 Holocaust, to more recent films like Schindler’s
List, Life is Beautiful, and Inglorious Basterds, to name a few, we will work to understand the continuing
importance and politics of remembrance when it comes to the Holocaust.
Through class discussion, students will interact with the materials, the instructor, and their peers. In the
process, they will practice both their public speaking skills, and learn how to engage critically with the
arguments and evidence of the texts. As this is a writing intensive course students will also regularly
practice their writing skills in four short papers, a midterm paper, and a final paper. Students will learn
how to use both primary and secondary sources in these writing exercises as well as further develop their
research skills, especially when it comes to locating relevant academic secondary sources. In both the
written assignments and the class discussions, students will develop their analytical skills by identifying
the course readings’ main theses, supporting arguments, evidence, assumptions, and rhetorical strategies.
Course Requirements:
1. Participation. Students are expected to read the assigned texts before class (by the date indicated
on the syllabus), and to be prepared to discuss them in class. At times, students will be given
‘discussion points’ to prepare for class (as listed on the syllabus).
2. Assignments: There are 4 short assignments in this course, each 2-3 pages long, with the topics
stated on the syllabus. Each assignment is worth 5% of the final grade.
3. Midterm Paper: 5-6 pages, due at the beginning of class on March 14th. The paper topics will be
distributed two weeks in advance and you will be given the opportunity to submit a draft of your
paper a week before the deadline to receive comments from me.
4. Final Paper: 7-8 pages, due on the last day of class, May 1st. The paper topics will be distributed
two weeks in advance and you will be given the opportunity to submit a draft of your paper a week
before the deadline to receive comments from me.
5. Final Exam: The final exam is a cumulative in-class exam. Students will receive a study sheet to
help them prepare for that exam.
Grading:
In-class participation:
Assignments:
Midterm Paper (March 4th)
Final Paper (May 1st)
Final Exam (May 13th)
10%
20%
25%
25%
20%
Attendance policy:
Attendance is required. If you miss more than four classes, your grade will be lowered by a third of a grade
(from B+ to B, for example). If you miss more than six classes, your grade will be lowered by one full
grade (B+ to C+, for example). Any student who misses eight or more sessions through any combination
of excused and unexcused absences will not earn credit in this class. Such students should withdraw from
the class.
Excused absences from exams will only be granted for students who can document medical or family
emergency. Students who feel a personal emergency is sufficiently grave to warrant an excused absence
must speak with me BEFORE the exam is to take place. Students who are unclear about the course’s
requirements should speak to me early in the semester.
Policy on Academic Integrity (Cheating and Plagiarism):
Rutgers University treats cheating and plagiarism as serious offenses. The standard minimum
penalties for students who cheat or plagiarize include failure of the course, disciplinary probation,
and a formal warning that further cheating will be grounds for expulsion from the University. All
students are required to sign the Rutgers Honor Code Pledge. To receive credit, every assignment
must have your signature under the following phrase: “On my honor, I have neither received nor
given any unauthorized assistance on this examination / assignment.”
Required Texts:
 Doris Bergen: War and Genocide. A Concise History of the Holocaust (Rowman and Littlefield,
2nd edition, 2009 – ISBN: 978-0742557154)
 Donald Niewyk: The Holocaust: Problems and Perspectives of Interpretation, (Cengage Learning,
4th edition, 2010 – ISBN: 978-0547189468.)
 Christopher Browning: Ordinary Men. Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in
Poland (Harper Perennial Reprint, 1998 – ISBN: 978-0060995065)
 Primo Levi: Survival in Auschwitz (Touchstone, 1995 – ISBN: 978-0684826806)
Course Website
You will find a copy of this syllabus at the Blackboard course website (blackboard.newark.rutgers.edu), in
case you should lose this one. From time to time, I will also post additional materials (images that we
discuss in class, texts that I discuss in lectures which are not in the textbooks, etc.) If there are any changes
to the syllabus, I will announce these in class and then post them on the website. I will also use the
electronic roster to send e-mails to all students, if there are announcements to be made. You are
responsible to check your university email account regularly to be sure that you receive those
announcements.
Schedule of Topics and Readings:
Week 1
January 21st: Introduction
January 23rd: Germans and Jews: Background
Readings:
Bergen: 1-29
Niewyk: Weiss (“Anti-Semitism Through the Ages”)
Week 2
January 28th: The Nazi Party
Readings:
Bergen: 29-52
January 30th: Excluding Jews
Readings:
Kaplan: Between Dignity and Despair, 17-74 and 119-145 (74-119 optional) BB
Assignment: According to Kaplan, what were the main methods used by the Nazi party to exclude
Jews from German society? Were they mainly legal methods or should we focus on other aspects
of exclusion in order to better understand the persecution of Jews in the period before the
outbreak of the war?
Week 3
February 4th: Purifying the Social Body: The Disabled, Roma, and Asocials
Readings:
Bergen: 53-81 and 125-129.
February 6th: Pursuing Enemies: The SS abd the Security State
Readings:
Bergen: 81-125
Week 4
February 11th: Nazi Germany Faces East: Planning a War of Annihilation
Readings:
Bergen: 131-161
Browning: 1-49
February 13th: Bloodlands: Murder Squads in the East
Readings:
Browning: 49-103
Desbois: Holocaust by Bullets (Excerpt) BB
Week 5
February 18th: Ordinary Men
Readings:
Browning: 103-191
Assignment: TBD This will be an assignment on Browning’s book.
February 20th: Nazi New Order in Western Europe
Readings:
Bergen: 161-205
Niewyk: Paxton/Marrus (“Western Europeans and the Jews”)
Week 6
February 25th: Nazi New Order in Eastern Europe
Readings:
Niewyk: Gutman/Krakowski (“The Poles Helped Persecute the Jews”)
Lukas (“The Poles Were Fellow Victims”)
February 27th: Righteous Gentiles
Readings:
Niewyk: Tec (“Righteous Gentiles”)
Week 7
March 4th: Life and Death in the Ghetto
Readings:
Documents on the Holocaust (Excerpts) BB
MIDTERM PAPER DUE
March 6th: The Judenrat
Readings:
Niewyk: Diner (“Why the Jewish Councils Cooperated”)
Documents on the Holocaust (Excerpts) BB
Week 8
March 11th: The Problems of Jewish Resistance
Readings:
Niewyk: Hilberg (“Two Thousand Years of Jewish Appeasement”)
Bauer (“Forms of Jewish Resistance”)
March 13th: The Victims’ Experience I
Readings:
Niewyk: Bettelheim (“Helpless Victims”)
Des Pres (“The Will to Survive”)
Week 9
Spring Break – HAVE FUN!
Week 10
March 25th: The Victims’ Experience II
Readings:
Niewyk: Levi (“The Gray Zone”)
Waxman (“Women and the Holocaust”)
March 27th: Possibilities of Rescue I
Readings:
Niewyk: Wyman (“The Abandonment of the Jews”)
Rubinstein (“The Myth of Rescue”)
Assignment: TBD This will be an assignment on some of the reasons why the rest of the world
did not come to the rescue of the Jews. What were some of the possible reasons why.
Week 11
April 1st: Possibilities of Rescue II
Readings:
Niewyk: Phayer (“The Silence of Pope Pius XII”)
Lacquer (“The Failure to Comprehend”)
April 3rd: The Camps: Perspective of a Homosexual Survivor
Readings:
Heger: 27-97 (the rest of the book is optional) BB
Week 12
April 8th: The Camps: Perspective of a Jewish Male Survivor
Readings:
Levi: 13-37, 77-122 (the rest is optional)
April 10th: The Camps: Perspectives of Jewish Female Survivors
Readings:
Women in the Holocaust (excerpts) BB
Assignment: TBD This will be an assignment comparing the different experiences the survivor’s
had, focusing on whether gender, race, class, nationality etc. had an effect on the way that people
experienced the camps.
Week 13
April 15th: The End of the War: Seeking Justice
Readings:
Wright: “The Nuremberg Trial” BB
Marrus: “The Nuremberg Trial. Fifty Years After” BB
April 17th: The Politics and Debates Surrounding The Eichmann Trial
Readings:
Arendt: Eichmann In Jerusalem (excerpt) BB
Week 14
April 22nd: Remembering the Holocaust I
Documentary: Imaginary Witness
April 24th: Remembering the Holocaust II
Documentary: Imaginary Witness continued
Week 15
April 29th: The Shoah and Trauma
Online Viewing: Excerpts from Shoah (available on Blackboard)
May 1st: The Holocaust in American Life
Readings: Novick: The Holocaust in American Life (excerpt) BB
FINAL PAPER IS DUE
FINAL EXAM: May 13th, 3-6pm.