Germany
has a unique relationship with nationalism. In “Media and Reinvention of the
Nation,” Silvio Waisbord states that the concept of nationalism originated out
of the disorganization born out of the political and socioeconomic factions of
the post-French revolution era. “Nationalists believed that culture, rather than
economics or politics, keeps societies together” (Waisbord, p. 376). After World
War II and the fall of the Third Reich, Germans were taught to be wary of
nationalistic views, lest they fall victim to the same ideologies of National
Socialism (NS) propagated by the Nazi party. How can a country reestablish its
national image and move forward from past injustices, but still operate with
enough caution to make sure those injustices are never repeated, in what some
scholars call a combination of “memory and learning?” This task has fallen to
educators in Germany, whose primary goal is reflected in the words of Theodor
W. Adorno, the co-founder of critical theory, who stated that the “very first
demand on education is that there not be another Auschwitz” (Meseth and Proske,
2010). Educators in Germany are supposed to focus on a human-rights education
of tolerance and democratic values. Studies show that they are failing.
As
illustrated, anti-Semitism did not end with the liberation of concentration
camps. Young people in Germany feel disconnected from the Holocaust, and much
of that can be traced to teachings in schools. Classroom education offers a
sterile approach and provides students with statistics that focus on histories
of deportations and anti-Jewish legislation. The approach largely lacks pathos,
or an emotional appeal; the most humanizing effect achieved, however, is a
negative one. Young Germans can often only see Jewish people as victims and are
left unable to empathize, identify, or relate to them as a people (Urban,
2008). “Most young Germans are able to understand what the Holocaust was, but
not who it happened to. In most German schools, there is very little talk about
Judaism, Jewish culture and history. Jews only appear in textbooks dealing with
the Crusades and with the Holocaust” (Fleshler, 2012). One of the key issues we
analyze in this paper is simple: there is a growing thy toward the Holocaust and
rising anti-Semitism in Germany. The government has given the education system
the responsibility to foster a moral conscience among students, but an inherent
paradox exists in this framework.
Ethics
in Education and the Negative Consequences of Moralization
In
terms of pedagogical ethics, an educator is required to remain objective and
cannot force feelings of morality and empathy in the classroom. The goal of
education in Germany specifically is two-fold; one side is reflective of German
culture as separate from National Socialism, and the second was created
directly because of it. German students are taught to reach independent
judgments, but they are also expected to find the history of National Socialism
morally reprehensible. A student is supposed to be a free and autonomous being,
a concept deeply rooted in German culture, which creates a contradiction one
study linked to the philosophy of Immanual Kant: “How do I cultivate freedom
through coercion?” (Meseth and Proske, 2010).
Essentially, education should exert emotional influence on the students
without compromising their self-determination.
Both
the conceptual structure and the tactics employed in the classroom are deeply
flawed; when moral empathy is created in the classroom, however, the effect is
no less troubling. Instances in which students achieve “appropriate” moral
reactions to their history lessons do not suggest Germany has effectively
communicated its history. For those students who have been emotionally affected
by classroom teaching on the Holocaust, a new form of trauma has been created,
called “NS-Traumatik.” The word “trauma” is applied to events that leave
psychological scarring, in which the pain of the past shapes the present
experiences of one’s life. “Trauma embeds the past into the present as an
involuntary memory that appears over and over again; it cannot be forgotten”
(Meseth and Proske, 2010). Discussions of trauma and the Holocaust are
naturally appropriated to the experiences of the victims. But experts have
discovered that the term can also be applied to the German conscience, and a
“collective trauma” has now become a part of German’s national identity, encompassing
the guilt and shame of the perpetrators and their descendants instead of the
suffering of the victims.
As
a result of this “NS-Traumatik,” studies are showing that while ignorance about
the Holocaust is a growing problem in German youth, focusing on the Holocaust
too much is contributing to the rise of anti-Semitism in Germany. “Education about
the Nazis often imposes ‘exaggerated moral expectations’ on students, who
respond with an anti-Semitism that is typified by ‘guilt denial’…they feel
accused of acts they had nothing to do with. Some hate the Jews for putting
them in this situation” (Fleshler, 2012). This over-education on the subject is
leading to what is known as “Holocaust fatigue.” Sixty-seven percent of Germans
find it “annoying that Germans are still held responsible for crimes against
the Jews” (Fleshler, 2012).
Questions
of Identity: Individual and National
German
youth are determined to develop a personal identity that is separate from the
Holocaust, and adults are weary of not having had the option themselves. They
are searching for a more normative German national identity. Many German
adolescents feel that the Holocaust is too much of a burden and that it has
been over-represented in public discussion. Moreover, those who seek to return
to a traditional German identity of nationalism attempt to rationalize the
Holocaust as a comparable crime of human history, similar to the American
treatment of Native Americans and African Americans. These individuals have a
predisposition to reject the notion that the Holocaust was unique and set apart
from other crimes against humanity. One study argued that German youth need to
understand the Holocaust as a part of the German collective identity, “because
you can neither rewrite history nor escape the fact that you are shaped by your
social and cultural background” (Meseth and Proske, 2010).
The creation and maintenance of a
national identity is central to discussions about communication in German, but
some scholars argue that focusing on national identity is also a key to
reducing anti-Semitism. Holocaust education focuses too much on the concentration
camps through which Jews were forced to suffer and not enough on their culture
and identities outside of the Holocaust.
“Of course they need to know
about Dachau and the Kristallnacht. The problem is that, especially for young
people, teenagers, the atrocities are hard to imagine, they seem unreal. But
they can easily learn about those who lived down the street, around the corner”
(Fleshler, 2012). If education stopped portraying Jews as an “other” and as
victims of German cruelty, then students would be able to understand Jewish
culture, especially in Germany, as a shared national identity.
While
there are many debates on how to improve holocaust education in Germany, some
countries believe it should be stopped altogether. In Britain, Lord Baker of
Dorking, who spent three years as Margaret Thatcher’s education secretary, has
argued that the teaching of Holocaust should be banned in British schools,
arguing that it causes British students to think “less favorably” of modern
Germans (Rowley, 2011). He argues that British students should learn British
history, not German. But experts from the Holocaust Centre argued that the
Holocaust was a European-wide crime, suggesting that the Germans alone cannot
be held responsible. Despite this argument, the Holocaust still remains central
to German national identity.
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