"Racist Killings and Mourning Songs"
Reading and Discussion with German-Jewish Writer Esther Dischereit
Tuesday, October 8
11:30 a.m.
125 Nolte Centre
Recently, the discovery of 10 years of racist killings by the "National Socialist Underground" (NSU), a neo-Nazi underground guerrilla organization, has shocked the German public. Dischereit has since become the most important independent voice for the public, extensively covering the legal and political investigations of this unprecedented crime in post-war Germany involving police, secret service, politicians and state officials. Unlike standard media coverage Dischereit wants to let the voices of the victims and their families be heard. The Mourning Songs tell each story of a murder from the families' unique and painful perspective and memory, and challenge racism and xenophobia wherever it is to be found; out on the streets or inside official state institutions. Dischereit, who conducted countless interviews with the victims' families, voices her perspective of telling and mourning for the victims of various ethnic backgrounds. The Mourning Songs is one part of Dischereits' unique libretto project "Mourning Songs - Flowers for Otello: On the Crime of Jena" which has just been produced for the German radio by Deutschlandradio Kultur.
Esther Dischereit is one of the most exciting writers and thought-provoking public intellectuals in Germany today. Her poems, novels, essays, films, plays, and radio plays, and her opera libretti and sound installations offer unique insights into Jewish life in contemporary Europe. Dischereit, who was born into a survivor's family, is an artist of the Second Generation, who analyzes power relationships surrounding the body, femininity, expressions of minorities, and the different functions and forms of remembrance, ritual, and memory. Dischereit often initiates cross art projects for which she collaborates with composers, musicians, dancers and graphic art designers.
Please join us for the reading (in German, English, and Turkish) and discussion (English) of this unique, critical, and contemporary work, and meet Esther Dischereit and the translator Iain Galbraith.
Sponsored by: German, Scandinavian & Dutch, Center for Jewish Studies, Center for Holocaust & Genocide Studies, Center for Austrian Studies, Center for German and European Studies.
For more information: Amanda Haugen, E-mail: gsd@umn.edu, Phone: 612-625-2080
