Learning about the Holocaust is part of the National Curriculum for all secondary school students in Britain, but a growing number of primary schools participate in Holocaust Memorial Day. Since more information about the past than ever before is freely available to children via the internet, the likelihood of young children asking parents or teachers about the Holocaust is higher than ever before.
To help respond to this shifting educational landscape, The Wiener Library is delighted to announce a panel discussion that will bring together three different points of view on the best ways of introducing the subject to young people. The event will be chaired by former children’s laureate Michael Rosen.
The speakers include Sue Berelowitz, the Deputy Children’s Commissioner for England, Dan Stone, Professor of History at Royal Holloway, University of London, Rachel Donnelly, Holocaust Learning Officer at the Imperial War Museum and Emma O’Brien of the Holocaust Education Development Programme at the Institute of Education.
Venue: The Wiener Library, 29 Russell Square, London WC1B 5DP
Time: 7pmAdmission is free of charge, but places must be reserved in advance by
emailing the Library or calling 020 7636 7247.
Part of the 'Making Histories' Lecture Series in partnership with the Pears Institute for the History of Antisemitism. During 1941-3, the murder of the Jews became well-known in Germany and widely commented on, both in private and public. What this spreading awareness of the genocide meant to German society has been widely discussed amongst historians. In this lecture, Nicholas Stargardt argues that German perceptions of the Holocaust were primarily shaped by their changing views of the war, with their own predicament, rather than that of the Jews, taking centre stage.
Nick Stargardt is the author of Witnesses of War: Children's Lives under the Nazis (Cape, 2005), and is completing a social history of Germany during the Second World War. He is Professor of Modern European History at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Magdalen College.
Venue: Room B33 (Torrington Square main entrance), Birkbeck, University of London, Bloomsbury, London WC1E 7HX
*
Please note that due to the popularity of this event, the location of this lecture has now been changed.
Time: 6.30pm
Admission to this event is free, but places can be booked online in advance through the
Pears Institute.
Dr Tim Grady presents his new book, The German-Jewish Soldiers of the First World War in History and Memory, published by Liverpool University Press. The book explores the changing relationship between Jewish and non-Jewish Germans through the prism of remembrance for the German-Jewish soldiers who fought in the First World War.
Venue: The Wiener Library, 29 Russell Square, London WC1B 5DP
Time: 6.30pm
Admission to this event is free, but please
email the Library or call 020 7636 7247 to reserve a place.
On 16 September 1933 Adolf Hitler attended the much-anticipated premiere of Hitlerjunge Quex in Munich. The film directed by Hans Steinhoff, was based on a successful novel of the same name by Karl A. Schenzinger, and the English language version was described as ‘genuinely entertaining’ by the New York Times in July 1934. The main character of the film was based on the life of Hitler Youth Herbert Norkus, who was killed in a Berlin street fight in 1932. The screening will be introduced by Daniel Siemens (UCL/SSEES), the author of an acclaimed book on Horst Wessel, another celebrated ‘martyr’ of the Nazi movement.
Venue: The Wiener Library, 29 Russell Square, London WC1B 5DP
Time: 6.30pm
Admission is free of charge, but places must be reserved in advance by
emailing the Library or calling 020 7636 7247.
Historians of the Holocaust know teaching values through history is not always an easy task. The Wiener Library is happy to announce an event that will discuss the ‘uses of history’ in the context of growing awareness about the persecution of homosexuals in Nazi Germany in British schools.
The speakers on the panel will include Elly Barnes, who recently topped The Independent’s ‘Pink List’. Barnes has fought successfully against homophobia at Stoke Newington school, in part by encouraging students and teachers to celebrate LGBT history month every year. Also joining the panel are Lou Hart, the Director of Camden LGBT Forum, and William Spurlin, Professor of English at Brunel University, who has published extensively on the persecution of homosexuals in Nazi Germany.
Venue: The Wiener Library, 29 Russell Square, London WC1B 5DP
Time: 6.30pm
Admission is free of charge, but please
email the Library or call us on 020 7636 7247 to reserve a place.
For those of you who are curious to see the interior of the new building, or for anyone who wants to visit us for the first time, we are holding an Open Day on Sunday 4 March. There will be the chance to take a tour around the Library's first ever exhibition about childhood under the Nazis, as well as an opportunity to view our new Reading Room.
Attendance is free, but please
email the Library or call us on 020 7636 7247 to reserve a space.
For details of past events at the Library, please
click here.