Controversies of Holocaust Memory: Uniqueness, Nationalism, Popular Culture, & Beyond

Catalog description

We say Zachor! Remember! but what does it mean to remember the Holocaust? For survivors it means one thing, for Germany another, and for a filmmaker something else entirely. This course examines the complexity of memory, so central to our work as Holocaust and Genocide scholars and educators. Rather than treating Holocaust memory as a stable or self-evident good, the course approaches memory as a historically contingent, socially produced, and ethically complex practice. Students engage major theoretical frameworks in memory studies including collective memory, postmemory, multidirectional memory, and prosthetic memory and apply them to concrete examples such as testimony, memorials, museums, popular culture, and digital technologies. Emphasis is placed on evaluating the strengths and limits of competing approaches to Holocaust memory and on developing a reflective perspective suited to professional practice in Holocaust education, so when we say Remember! we know what we mean.