Historical Awareness and Democratic Education – How do German schools teach about the Holocaust?
Most of today’s school students belong to the fourth generation after the Holocaust; they are therefore the first generation with almost no direct familial ties to this chapter of their country’s history. Contact to survivors and contemporary witnesses became extremely rare and the temporal distance leads to a significant shift in the students’ relation to the past.
The upcoming talk will elaborate on questions regarding these challenges to Holocaust education in Germany and will present an overview of the core values and paradigms shaping the didactic approach to the topic. Based on a brief introduction to the German school system, it will outline the current school curricula, their guidelines and main objectives, and provide an insight into their general premises and orientation. Focusing on the actual teaching situation, the talk will also address possible areas of conflict and disruption, and will point to potential shortcomings of the prevailing model of teaching.
This seminar will be held in English. Free admission.