Language:
English
Year of publication:
2005
Titel der Quelle:
Cultural Analysis
Angaben zur Quelle:
4 (2005) 47-65
Keywords:
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) Influence
;
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) Influence
;
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) Influence
Abstract:
After World War II, the narrative of national victimhood eclipsed heroism as a pillar of postwar national identity for Europeans; "deportation" rather than "resistance" became the main metonymy of the war. Links this to the increasing significance of the idea of human rights within a broader modern rhetoric of individual and group identity. Notes that in 1945-65 this development failed to draw public attention to the Holocaust as a singular event. In many ways, the genocide of Jews did not fit in the framework of martyred nations. The murdered Jews were not forgotten, but they became mainly a moral yardstick by which to measure suffering - only one incident in a universe of atrocities committed by both sides during the war. Even in West Germany it was common to conflate the sufferings of German expellees from the East and of German POWs with the victims of the Holocaust. It was only after 1965 that the singularity of the Holocaust was realized in West Germany. Pp. 66-72 contain a response by Robert G. Moeller, and pp. 73-75 contain a response by Jay Winter entitled "Memory and Human Rights". Moeller points to the Cold War as a factor in the trivialization of the Holocaust in West Germany, and argues that the realization of its singularity came as early as the late 1950s rather than after 1965.
Description / Table of Contents:
Moeller, Robert G.. Response. 66-72.
Description / Table of Contents:
Winter, Jay. Memory and human rights. 73-75.
URL:
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