Holocaust Classroom Presentations (High School)
Antisemitism: When One Hate Rises, They All Do
Studying hate will tell us little about the group being targeted, but much about the destructive and self-destructive motives of perpetrators. How do we identify, resist, and respond to antisemitism, racism, and other hatreds? Using IHRA’s working definition of antisemitism we will identify sources and expressions of hate and reasons for their recent surge, We will explore what it means to embrace democratic values and norms as a tool of resistance and resilience. Rather than assign labels, we will explore models of appropriate responses and our obligation to reject anti-democratic and hate-driven behavior. We will highlight how white supremacists and terrorists are globally connected and pose a direct threat to us all.
Antisemitisms: Hatred as Identity
Antisemitism is a dynamic and durable force of hate. It is toxic to democracy and potentially lethal to its targets - especially when expressed as conspiracy fantasies. This presentation explores the origins of antisemitism. Utilizing Rabbi Jonathan Sak’s metaphor of a “mutating virus” we will examine antisemitism as a psychological construct of an "other". How do issues of identity (individual and collective) allow the cultural expression of antisemitism? How do trauma and fear feed antisemitic anxieties and identities? We will trace the development of antisemitic ideas from its Christian roots of anti-Judaism to modern antisemitism. This presentation broadly examines the difficult relationship between Judaism and Christianity and Christianity's wrestling with its own assumptions and traditions while facing the darkness of the Holocaust. We will wrestle with current manifestations of antisemitism from Nazi Germany to the QAnon conspiracy fantasies, recognizing that when one hate rises, they all do.
QAnon Conspiracy Fraud:
QAnon emerged in 2017 and has gone from being a fringe conspiracy to one embraced by political leaders. What is the QAnon fraud? We will explore this new transmission and expression of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion by examining its antisemitic roots and mainstream appeal – especially in the wake of the Covid- 19 pandemic. What are the characteristics of conspiratorial thinking? How and why can people accept and justify these frauds? Why do conspiracy theory frauds threaten democracy? How do they damage and mislead? How do we recognize and respond to the threat and talk to somebody who embraces it?
Traveling and Studying in Israel
This presentation developed from trips to Israel and will serve as a fun travelogue illustrating the geography, culture, and history of Israel. Particular focus will be given to the Old City of Jerusalem as well as Jewish, Christian and Muslim holy sites. Additionally, we will visit the landscapes of the Galilee, Masada, the Dead Sea, as well as the Jordanian and Lebanese borders. The presentation will end by highlighting the work and mission of Yad Vashem.
Heeding the Warning Signs: Antecedents and Precursors to the Holocaust
How was the Holocaust not just possible, but permissible? How did the Nazi movement gain momentum, professional “buy in”, and develop their expertise in mass atrocity? This presentation explores the politics of hate in the German white nationalist movement after World War I by focusing on how the Nazi targeted the “Rhineland bastards”, homosexuals, “social criminals”, inferior “races”, and Jews. As authoritarianism gained mainstream acceptance, many segments of society became invested in targeting groups deemed as social, cultural, and racial “threats”. The more urgently the threat was defined, the more people pressed to find increasingly radical solutions to the “problems” they imagined needed to be solved. Nazism offered a false sense of national unity in a time of confusion and change. By fighting and winning the battle against social and cultural enemies the Nazis suggested that national redemption could be won. How do we identify these anti-democratic processes of targeted hate that feed authoritarianism and threaten a society’s freedom and safety?
Strongmen: Authoritarian and Fascist Leaders
Facing the growth of anti-democratic movements, white supremacy, and would-be strongmen authoritarians, how do we perceive, identify, and confront the threat? What do strongmen have in common? What is in their toolbox and playbook as they seek to destroy democratic norms? This presentation examines how strongman emerge in times of perceived crisis (times of change, trauma, and perceived threats to “masculinity”) and utilize violence, misogyny, and attacks on truth to gain power and bludgeon democracy. Embracing the values of American democracy, we explore the corrupting and dysfunctional nature of strongman politics and the practical historical responses that reinforce democratic resilience.
Rise of the Nazis: The Plot to Destroy Democracy (1919-1933)
Did the Nazis come to power through coercion and/or consent? How was Hitler, a constant failure, rescued by those who wished to use him? How did he become chancellor? We will trace Hitler’s failures, personality, and myths while exploring his changing political tactics. We will examine the inability of opposition parties to unify against Nazism. Close attention will be focused on how Article 48 (Presidential rule by decree) enabled a small group of anti-democratic, conservative and nationalist politicians and aristocrats, to wield extraordinary power in a plot to destroy the Weimar Republic. We will explore their fatal mistake of rescuing Hitler from failure in order to champion conservative and nationalist agendas. Once Hitler was named chancellor he and his collaborators dismantled the Weimar Republic within five months.
Destroying Democracy from Within: Failure and Limits of Democratic Institutions (1933-1938)
What happens when the judiciary sides with or accommodates with an authoritarian leader? Hitler was a consistent failure, rescued throughout his political career by conservatives and nationalists who believed the system would hold him in check while they exploited his appeal. Hitler had a great contempt for law but came to see the benefits - especially with the need to persuade a variety of German conservatives - to progressively remove human rights from those he perceived as dangerous threats to his idea of the German volk. This presentation examines how some conservatives overcame their general sense of unease to help the Nazis destroy democracy and build a police and terror state; how target groups were created, how professionals and institutions "bought in"; how the police and the judiciary supported the expansion of Nazi power; the struggle between the states, judiciary, and SS over control of policy; the development of and role played by the concentration camp system; and the state security police apparatus. We will explore how mass atrocity not only became possible, but permissible.
Purity, Eugenics, and Lethal Medicine
How did an elitist, antidemocratic, race-based, antisemitic ideology became popular and get implemented in the U.S. before Hitler came to power in Germany? Although discussed amongst small cliques of intellectuals in Europe, how did eugenics become mainstream in American practice, politics, and law with a diverse and sometimes contradictory coalition of supporters? What are the connections to and differences between American and Nazi German eugenics practices? To what degree was Nazi race law, marriage law, forced sterilization, the Nuremberg Laws, children’s “euthanasia”, the T4 Euthanasia program informed by eugenic ideas and American precedents such as Jim Crow? How does the German medical profession come to perceive their patients as threats and justify their murderous actions towards them as moral and necessary? How did early sterilization policies differ from the decisions to murder patients? How can eugenics history help to confront the threat of racism and white supremacy?
The United States and the Ongoing Challenge of Nazism and Nazi Germany
Exploring democratic resilience in the face of fascist fear. President Roosevelt was able to rescue liberal democracy through an uncomfortable partnership with the Southern Democratic Party that combined progressive ideas with Jim Crow racism. We will contrast Hitler’s leadership with FDR’s and explore how FDR’s “missionary generation” responded to the threat of Nazism. Policy decisions are presented in the context of the unfolding events between 1933 and 1938 and the growing need to respond to international provocations. Topics covered include: U.S. immigration policy and the quota system; U.S. attitudes of pacifism, isolationism, racism, xenophobia and antisemitism; supporters of fascism in the U.S.; America First; failed anti-lynching legislation; the Evian Refugee Conference; the German American Bund; Charlie Chaplin; and the failed Wager-Rogers kindertransport bill. How does the past help us find resilience in the struggle to preserve democracy?
Learning from the Past: Facing Difficult History in the U.S. and Germany
How did American racism influence German race policy and how does German encounter with its Nazi past help Americans confront their difficult history of slavery? What do cultures of defeat (the Confederacy and post WW I German society) have in common? How did the creation of the “Lost cause” myth distort the history of the Civil War and facilitate a different re-enslavement of black Americans? This presentation explores implicit and explicit bias that leads to racism. Racism will be a central theme of the presentation as we explore how leaders manipulate it to the detriment of most. We will explore the second Civil War (the War against Reconstruction) and how its ideology of racism has influenced the American experience. We will explore the for-profit convict labor system that helped entrench a new form of slavery and Hollywood’s subtle and not-so-subtle embrace of both racism and the southern myth of the “Lost cause.” As antisemitism, racism, Nazism, and the KKK have re-emerged as significant societal factors we must confront this difficult history as we explore the implications for the future. By highlighting examples of leadership and the influence of targeted minorities in enhancing democratic values, we explore how to utilize this history to promote competencies for democratic citizenship.
Elie Wiesel: Profound Trauma, Remembrance and Hope
This presentation explores the power, necessity, obligations and challenges of “remembering.” Using Wiesel’s text, Night, we will explore how traumatic memory is held and expressed. We will trace the life of Elie Wiesel from his birth in Sighet, Romania; his early, formative years as an Hasidic Jew; the unfolding situation in Hungary and Europe; the round-up of his family and deportation to Auschwitz; the fate of his family; and his post war experiences. We will discuss Night as a stylized, constructed memoir that begins Wiesel’s wrestling with his experience and the challenges of remembering. How is Night constructed? Why is it reduced /refocused from the original Yiddish? Why are there white spaces embedded in the text? How can silence tell a story? How can Wiesel and books like Night help us build resilience?
Anne Frank – To Be Free, to Be Myself
Who was Anne Frank and why are we focused on her tragedy? Why is it so hard for us to let others be? How do we identify hate and antisemitism? This presentation raises questions about how we think about and remember Anne and why. Anne’s diary reveals growth and introspection in the midst of building pressure. How does Anne's voice, shifting into an awareness of others, become, as she hoped, "useful" as we face the challenges of today? Drawing on the diary and Anne's experiences we will challenge our own prejudices and ask difficult questions of ourselves. Special attention is given to the memories of Hannah (Goslar) Pick, Anne’s childhood friend (whose January 2007 Yad Vashem interview will be used). The life and decisions of the Frank family (such as emigration and going into hiding) are placed within the context of the Nazi era and U.S. immigration policy. Otto Frank’s failed attempt to get his two children (Margot and Anne) into the United States begins a discussion about immigration policy and the villainization of immigrants and refugees. This presentation also traces the fate of those hiding in the Secret Annex. How can we draw on the example of the rescuers and of the Franks themselves to honor Anne's April 1944 wish, "If only I can be myself"?
Civil Society Between Darkness and Light: Danish Resistance and Rescue (1940-1946)
An exploration of the German occupation of Denmark, the Danish Resistance, the rescue operation to Sweden, and the postwar reintegration of Jewish refugees within historical context. What factors shaped Danish attitudes towards its Jewish neighbors? Was is the line between cooperating and collaborating? Why was the summer of 1943 the turning point? What was different about Nazi policy in Denmark? What vital role and example did Sweden provide? A particular focus will be on the fishing village of Gilleleje and those rescued and others captured and sent to Theresienstadt. Two child survivor testimonies recorded in October 2015 (Ole Philpson and Tove Udshott) will be utilized. By examining Denmark’s unique experience and its testament to civil society before, during, and after the Holocaust, we raise questions about how to improve civic responsibility and build stronger democracies.
France Under Nazi Occupation: Memory, Myth, and Misogyny
Exploring the traumatic history of France during World War II, this presentation explores collaboration, the Holocaust, resistance, and memory. How is "collaboration" defined, who defines it, and why? What role did contentious politics and ideological divides play in Vichy collaboration and the Holocaust? How does memory continue to be a battleground between the right and the left? How does gender shape interpretations of the past? What was unique about the French experience? Why did a greater percentage of its Jews survive the Holocaust? Topics covered include: the ongoing political conflict between left and right; the defeat of France in 1940; antisemitism; Vichy collaboration; French resistance; French police roundups; "Vél d'Hiv" roundup; French prisoners of war; volunteer and forced labor in the Reich. How does this examination of a difficult past help us to confront our own difficult and traumatic history?
The Holocaust: The Twisted Road to Auschwitz
This presentation focuses on the cascading radicalization and evolution to genocide that took place from 1939-1945. We explore how Nazi policy accelerated and adapted over time in the complex face of changing political, military, and social circumstances. Specific attention will be placed upon the Nazi racial laboratory of Poland 1939-1940. Topics to be covered include: Nazi ideology and the unfolding war situation; the influence of location; emerging role of the SS; the difficulties and failures of implementing emigration policy and demographic engineering; the failure and complicity of the Wehrmacht; the T4 Program; ghettos; General Plan Ost and the Commissar Order; the Wannsee Conference; the Einsatzgruppen and the “Final Solution.” By exploring individual initiative of “working towards the Führer” we will examine the “moral universe” created by willing perpetrators. (For advanced classes.)
Treblinka: Evolution of a Killing Center
Operation Reinhard killing camps (Bełżec, Sobibor, Treblinka) operated from 1942-1943 and murdered an estimated 1.7 million people. There were less than 150 survivors. This presentation seeks to focus attention on the deadliest phase of the “Final Solution” by exploring the development of Treblinka and the killing processes that took place there. The site encompassed a forced-labor camp (Treblinka I) and a killing center (Treblinka II). By the time that Treblinka was dismantled in 1943, an estimated 925,000 Jews--as well as an unknown number of Poles, Roma, Soviet POWs--had been murdered there. Treblinka was the second largest killing site during the Holocaust. How was Treblinka connected to the T4 “Euthanasia” program? What was its place and function during the Holocaust? How was it designed to deceive and to annihilate? How did it evolve in its killing procedures? Who were the organizers and perpetrators? How did the prisoner uprising of 1943 help to close the camp? (For advanced classes.)
The Power of Place: Encountering Auschwitz
How does one encounter the killing site of Auschwitz? What can we learn? How and what do we "remember"? Based upon visiting Auschwitz I and II in November 2014 with the Auschwitz Institute for Peace and Reconciliation (AIPR) this presentation explores how ordinary people commit extraordinary evil. Weaving together archival images from a project by two Nazi photographers from the lab/identification service project in Auschwitz with photographs from the 2014 trip, we will explore the process of genocide and the "moral universe" the perpetrators created. We will explore the deliberate structures created to serve the needs of the SS, architects and businessmen in exploiting and destroying human beings. We will explore the challenges of encountering such a place, make room for mourning, refusing to normalize our outrage, and ask, "Where do we go from here?"