Borns Jewish Studies Program

The Holocaust is probably the most horrific and challenging phenomenon of the 20th Century. Yet it has taken some decades for the world to appreciate quite how much it has challenged inherited assumptions about progress and modernity. In the last decade or so, our understanding has been aided by the discovery of important new sources behind the former Iron Curtain. Against the background of the new historiography, this course will look at the origins and implementation of the Holocaust and also at the legacies and memories of the event. The big question it pursues is how the Holocaust could have taken place. What kind of intellectual and cultural pedigree did it have? How firmly rooted was it in modern society or in German culture? Alongside the Nazis, what were the roles of the wider German population, of Jewish organizations and Allied and international powers?