Barbara Frey, will present on Human Rights Advocacy in Mexico at the first HGMV workshop

"Uneven Ground: Asymmetries of Power in Human Rights Advocacy in Mexico"
Presented by Barbara Frey, Director, Human Rights Program
Thursday, October 2
3:00p.m.
Room 710 Social Sciences


The presentation is the first of the 2014-2015 workshops for the Holocaust, Genocide and Mass Violence Studies (HGMV) Interdisciplinary Graduate Group.



Professor Frey will explore the social and political context or "terrain" in which human
rights actors work in Mexico and the barriers to their success in protecting human rights on the ground. She will show how this terrain affects advocacy by describing one particular case, the campaign for due process reforms in the criminal justice system. Frey's central finding is that the terrain of human rights advocacy in Mexico is profoundly "uneven" - characterized by asymmetries of power that limit the effectiveness of the human rights movement to bring about sustainable human rights protections.
Barbara Frey is Director of the Human Rights Program in the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Minnesota. Frey has headed the Program since it was established in 2001, for the purpose of providing academic, research and outreach opportunities for students in the field of international human rights.
The HGMV workshop was founded to foster interdisciplinary conversations on the subject areas of Holocaust studies, genocide and memory, peace and conflict studies, human rights, nationalism and ethnic violence, representations of violence and trauma, conflict resolution, transitional justice, historical consciousness and collective memory.
For more information about HGMV please email Erma Nezirevic at nezir001@umn.edu.

Has German law been slow to prosecute perpetrators of the Holocaust?

Case against Oskar Gröning highlights Germany judiciary's Holocaust problem

Our Mothers, Our Heimat, Our Holocaust: "Ordinary" Nazis on German Television, 1984-2014

A Lecture by Offer Ashkenazi
Monday, September 22
4:00 p.m.
1210 Heller Hall



Edgar Reitz's groundbreaking TV drama "Heimat" aired 30 years ago in an attempt to 'take back" German history from the American entertainment industry. Going back to this drama -- and to the sequel and prequel Reitz directed during the past decades -- I will suggest that "Heimat" subtly provided a revolutionary portrayal of World War II as a framework in which "German" and "Jewish" categories have been melded together to create a new nation (or a genuine alternative to "American" imperialism). In emphasizing this process, I will look at more recent productions, such as "Generation War," to argue that Reitz's implicit notion of German-Jewish symbiosis has been replicated in later mainstream TV dramas. The transformation of this image, however, replaced the self-criticism (or self-mockery) of "Heimat" with a melodramatic affirmation of Germany's "cure" from its violent past.

Ofer Ashkenazi, Department of History Koebner-Minerva Center for German History
The Hebrew University, Jerusalem. Ashkenazi received his PhD in History from the Hebrew University in 2006 and conducted his post-doctoral research at the University of California, Berkeley, was a visiting professor at the University of Minnesota returning to Jerusalem, in the summer of 2013. During 2013-2014 he taught classes on the 'visual turn' in the study of history; cultural aspects of the Great War; film and history; and Nazism. His research interests include Central European cultural and intellectual history, modern visual culture, and Jewish urban experience in twentieth-century Europe. He is currently working on a research project that examines the works of filmmakers and photographers who emigrated from Germany during the 1930s. It explores the influence of the experiences, the intellectual paradigms, and the artistic imagination of the Weimar era on the development of various national cultures in post-1933 Europe, the United States and Israel.
Presented by the Department of German,Scandinavian& Dutch. Sponsored by: The Center for Holocaust & Genocide Studies, The Center for German & European Studies, The Department of History and the Center for Jewish Studies

Convert or Die Christian Persecution and the Rise of the Islamic State

A round table discussion with French author Richard Millet



Thursday, September 18
3:00pm
Room 710 Social Sciences Building

In recent months Christians in Iraq have been given a seriously stark choice by the terrorist group ISIS- "Convert, pay a religious tax, or die!" Forcing many to flee while others have been tortured and killed. Mainly unnoticed by the media the current crisis has hit peak levels and Iraqi Christians no longer feel safe in their homes or country.

French author Richard Millet will discuss the current situation giving insight into the crisis. Millet has spent many years in Lebanon living among the Christian Maronites his latest work on Middle Eastern Christians will be published in Paris later this year.

The lecture will be in French & English with a translation by Bruno Chaouat, Chair of the Department of French & Italian, and Monica Kelley, JD, PhD.

This is the first and long-awaited visit of Richard Millet to the United States. Millet is the author of over twenty books of fiction, a prolific essayist, and a beacon of the contemporary French novel. His essays have provoked robust debate in Europe. His eclectic writings include autobiographical novels that explore questions of origin, mourning and dereliction. His most recent work is on Charlotte Salomon, a German Jewish artist murdered at Auschwitz.

Sponsored by: Human Rights Program, Department of French & Italian and Program in Human Rights & Health

Photo: Eddie Potros

New Memorial to honor Poles who helped Jews during World War II to be built in Warsaw

New memorial to honour Poles who saved Jews from Holocaust
09-09-2014

Call for Abstracts Special Issue of Gender & History

Special Issue of Gender & History Volume 28:3 (November 2016)
Gender and Global Warfare in the Twentieth Century
Edited by Louise Edwards (UNSW Australia), Martha Hanna (University of Colorado), and Patricia M. E. Lorcin (University of Minnesota).




Gender & History calls for article abstracts for a special issue addressing 'Gender and Global Warfare in the Twentieth Century'. Although the occasion for this special issue is the centenary of the First World War, we are interested in contributions that provide a gendered analysis of modern warfare across the globe and throughout the twentieth century, as well as articles relating to the First World War era in particular. Scholarly contributions to the literature on gender and war are usually restricted to a specific war in a specific place, but the memory and trauma of past wars shape the politics, cultures and societies in post-war periods and create the basis on which future wars are waged, experienced or perceived.

We welcome papers that consider these connections by exploring the gendered implications of global warfare, and also papers that connect the First World War era with subsequent wars. We encourage potential contributors to consider larger questions of how gender analysis challenges or changes some of the categories that routinely inform war studies. We invite work that falls under one or more of the following rubrics: gendering engagement and resistance, sexuality and violence, politics and culture, memory and trauma, health practices and medicine, and ideologies of war. Interested authors are encouraged to consult the extended version of this call for abstracts on the Gender & History website by clicking here.
The production of the special issue will follow a symposium, to be held at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities in late April or early May 2015 (date to be announced), whose participants will be selected on the basis of the abstracts submitted. Please submit 1-2 page abstracts in English (500-750 words maximum) to gendhist@umn.edu by October 1, 2014, with 'Special Issue 28:3 abstract submission' in the subject line (limited funds for the translation of articles written in other languages might be available). Invitations to present at the symposium will be issued in November 2014. Papers must be submitted for pre-circulation to the editors by March 30, 2015, as a condition of participation.

Fellowship in Advanced Shoah Studies

The Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany (Claims Conference)
is offering a limited number of fellowships for Ph.D. and Post Doctoral Candidates
Conducting Research on the Holocaust.

The application deadline is January 5, 2015 for the academic year of 2015-2016.
Maximum Award Amount: $20,000 Per Year

The Saul Kagan Claims Conference Fellowship for Advanced Shoah Studies aims to strengthen Shoah studies and Holocaust memory throughout the world. Our mission is to support the advanced study of the fate of Jews who were systematically targeted for destruction or persecution by the Nazis and their allies between 1933 and 1945, as well as immediate post-war events.



Studies covered by the Fellowships can include the immediate historical context in which the Holocaust took place and encompass political, economic, legal, religious and socio-cultural aspects, as well as ethical and moral implications. The Fellowship also supports awardees in learning languages necessary to studying original Holocaust- related documents, such as languages of the former Soviet Union and certain European countries. Candidates can be pursuing a degree in a variety of fields, including History, Sociology, Philosophy, Judaic Studies, Political Science, Government, Women's Studies and other fields. Candidates focusing on the immediate aftermath of the Holocaust will also be considered.
For more information please click here.