David Crew

May be repeated for credit when the topics vary.

Prerequisite: Graduate standing and consent of the graduate adviser.

This seminar will analyze the effects of Hitler’s dictatorship upon German society, politics, economy and culture. It will explore the consequences of defeat, occupation, the Cold War and the political division of Germany after 1945. It will also compare and contrast the history and development of East and West Germany in the years between 1949 and 1989. Finally, the course will examine some of the consequences and prospects created by the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989 and the unification of East and West Germany in 1990.

Restricted to members of the Normandy Scholars Program

How was an obscure, unemployed Austrian, who never rose above the rank of corporal in the German army, able to become the leader of a mass political movement which overthrew the most democratic political system Germany had ever known? Why did Germany begin the most devastating and brutal war in world history just two decades after having lost the First World War? Why did the Nazi state systematically murder 6 million Jews? 

Texts

Peter Fritzsche, GERMANS INTO NAZIS

Erich Maria Remarque, ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT

J. Noakes and G. Pridham(editors), NAZISM. A HISTORY IN DOCUMENTS AND EYEWITNESS ACCOUNTS, 1919-1945 (University of Exeter Press Edition: Volumes 2 &3) Primo Levi, SURVIVAL IN AUSCHWITZ

Brian Ladd, THE GHOSTS OF BERLIN.CONFRONTING GERMAN HISTORY IN THE URBAN LANDSCAPE

Description: Despite the many calamities it caused and experienced in the twentieth century, the German state has persisted into our present as a leader in European politics, economy and society and an important international actor. To understand why this would be the case, this course treats the history of Germany in the “long” twentieth century, that is, from the intermediate background of WWI and the establishment of a unified German Empire (1871) to the present. Class time will alternate between lecture and discussion of primary source readings. Topics to be covered include: German economy, geography, and demography; national unification; German colonialism; Wilhelmine society and culture; the social and political status of German Jewry; the background, causes, and experience of WWI; the failed Communist Revolution of 1919; the emergence and decline of the Weimar state; the economic crisis of the interwar years; Weimar culture; National Socialism and the Third Reich; the experience and effects of WWII; the Holocaust; the constitution of East and West German states, societies, and cultures; the “economic miracle”; the Cold War in Germany; 1968 and its social effects; the revolutions of 1989; reunification; the experience of non-Germans in Germany since 1945; and Germany in the European Union. Where possible we will consider these themes in global context. Throughout, emphasis will fall on the reading and interpretation of primary sources in English translation, including text, film, photographs, and music.

Possible readings (selections – please consult the instructor for the final reading list before purchasing any items):

Stefan Zweig, The World of Yesterday; Ernst Jünger, Storms of Steel; Erich Maria Remarque, The Road Back; Fritz Stern, Five Germanys I Have Known; Kaes et al., The Weimar Republic Sourcebook (selections); Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf; Peter Fritzsche,Germans into Nazis; Arthur Koestler, The God that Failed; J.M. Keynes, The Economic Consequences of the Peace; Filip Müller,Eyewitness Auschwitz; Jana Hensel, After the Wall.

Probable grading scheme:

Map quiz=5%; Midterm 25%; Final exam 25%; Short paper 30%; other quizzes 15%.

This seminar will analyze the effects of Hitler’s dictatorship upon German society, politics, economy and culture. It will explore the consequences of defeat, occupation, the Cold War and the political division of Germany after 1945. It will also compare and contrast the history and development of East and West Germany in the years between 1949 and 1989. Finally, the course will examine some of the consequences and prospects created by the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989 and the unification of the two Germanies in 1990.

Texts

David Crew, editor, Nazism and German Society, 1933-1945(London and New York,1995)

Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz

Hanna Schissler,editor, The Miracle Years. A Cultural History of West Germany 1949-1968(Princeton,2001)

Katherine Pence and Paul Betts,editors, Socialist Modern.East German Everyday Culture and Politics(Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2008)

Anna Funder, Stasiland.Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall(London: Granta 2003)

Peter  Schneider, The Wall Jumper. A Berlin Story (Chicago,1983)

Daphne Berdahl, Where the World Ended. Re-Unification and Identity in the German Borderland((Berkeley/Los Angeles/London, 1999)

Grading

This is a substantial writing component course. You will be required to write three critical essays(6-8 pages each) which analyze the problems posed by selected readings from the above assigned reading list (each of these three essays is worth  20% of your final grade). You are encouraged to hand in rough drafts of each of these longer essays no less than 10 days before the due date for each assignment. In addition, you are required to write 2 short essays (2-3 pages in length) each of which analyzes examples of the visual materials I will hand out in class or a film relevant to this course(to be approved by the instructor). Each of these assignments counts for 10% of your final grade. Class participation counts for 20 per cent of your final grade.

How was an obscure, unemployed Austrian, who never rose above the rank of corporal in the German army, able to become the leader of a mass political movement which overthrew the most democratic political system Germany had ever known? Why did Germany begin the most devastating and brutal war in world history just two decades after having lost the First World War? Why did the Nazi state systematically murder 6 million Jews? How did the implementation of Nazi plans for a “racial empire” affect the lives of millions of Europeans during the Second World War? And what is the legacy of the Third Reich, for Germany today? These are the primary questions addressed by this course.

Texts

Peter Fritzsche, Germans into Nazis, Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front, Noakes and G. Pridham (editors), Nazism. A History in Documents and Eyewitness Accounts, 1919-1945 (University of Exeter Press Edition: Volumes 2 &3) Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz, Brian Ladd, The Ghosts of Berlin. Confronting German History in the Urban Landscape

Grading

Your general participation in class discussions (i.e. attendance + involvement) counts for 20% of the overall grade. The take-home mid-term document test (5-6 pages) is worth 20% of the final grade. There is no final exam per se but you will have a second take-home document test (5-6 pages) which is worth 20% of the final grade.. You will also be asked to write one short review of any one of the books by Remarque, or Levi (4-5 pages, 20% of final grade). Finally, you will be asked to write two  brief (2-3 page) analyses of the visual evidence(photographs, propaganda, election posters, etc.) that I will include among the class materials, or of recommended recent films on Nazi Germany. Each of these two assignments is worth 10% of the final grade.

350L

This seminar will analyze the effects of Hitler’s dictatorship upon German society, politics, economy and culture. It will explore the consequences of defeat, occupation, the Cold War and the political division of Germany after 1945. It will also compare and contrast the history and development of East and West Germany in the years between 1949 and 1989. Finally, the course will examine some of the consequences and prospects created by the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989 and the unification of the two Germanies in 1990.

Texts

David Crew, editor, Nazism and German Society, 1933-1945(London and New York,1995)

Omer Bartov, editor, The Holocaust : origins, implementation, aftermath (London and New York:Routledge, 2000)

Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz

Hanna Schissler,editor, The Miracle Years. A Cultural History of West Germany 1949-1968(Princeton,2001)

Katherine Pence and Paul Betts,editors, Socialist Modern.East German Everyday Culture and Politics(Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2008)

Anna Funder, Stasiland.Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall(London: Granta 2003)

Peter  Schneider, The Wall Jumper. A Berlin Story (Chicago,1983)

Daphne Berdahl, Where the World Ended. Re-Unification and Identity in the German Borderland((Berkeley/Los Angeles/London, 1999)

Grading

This is a substantial writing component course. You will be required to write three critical essays(6-8 pages each) which analyze the problems posed by selected readings from the above assigned reading list(each of these three essays is worth  20% of your final grade). You are encouraged to hand in rough drafts of each of these longer essays no less than 10 days before the due date for each assignment. In addition, you are required to write 2 short essays(2-3 pages in length)each of which analyzes examples of the visual materials I will hand out in class or a film relevant to this course(to be approved by the instructor). Each of these assignments counts for 10% of your final grade. Class participation counts for 20 per cent of your final grade.

Restricted to students in the Normandy Scholars Program. Application deadline was October 4, 2010; enrollment is closed.

How was an obscure, unemployed Austrian, who never rose above the rank of corporal in the German army, able to become the leader of a mass political movement which overthrew the most democratic political system Germany had ever known? Why did Germany begin the most devastating and brutal war in world history just two decades after having lost the First World War? Why did the Nazi state systematically murder 6 million Jews? How did the implementation of Nazi plans for a “racial empire” affect the lives of millions of Europeans during the Second World War? And what is the legacy of the Third Reich, for Germany today? These are the primary questions addressed by this course.

Texts

• Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front 
• David F. Crew, Hitler and the Nazis. A History in Documents (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005)
•  J. Noakes and G. Pridham(editors), Nazism. A History in Documents and Eyewitness Accounts, 1919-1945 (University of Exeter Press Edition: Volumes 2 &3)
• Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz
• [You can find good time-lines for the history of Hitler’s rise to power, for World War II in Europe, and for the Holocaust on the Internet  at http://www.historyplace.com/index.html. Each chronology provides detailed information on selected subjects, and a large number of contemporary photographs.
• We are also going to be working with the documents and images at this web-site: http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/. ] 

Grading

Your general participation in class discussions (i.e. attendance + involvement) counts for 20% of the overall grade. The take-home mid-term document test (5-6 pages) is worth 20% of the final grade. There is no final exam per se but you will have a second take-home document test (5-6 pages) which is worth 20% of the final grade.. You will also be asked to write one short review of any one of the books by Remarque, or Levi (4-5 pages, 20% of final grade). Finally, you will be asked to write two  brief (2-3 page) analyses of the visual evidence(photographs, propaganda, election posters, etc.) that I will include among the class materials, or of recommended recent films on Nazi Germany. Each of these two assignments is worth 10% of the final grade.

Restricted to students in the Normandy Scholars Program. Application deadline was October 4, 2010; enrollment is closed.

How was an obscure, unemployed Austrian, who never rose above the rank of corporal in the German army, able to become the leader of a mass political movement which overthrew the most democratic political system Germany had ever known? Why did Germany begin the most devastating and brutal war in world history just two decades after having lost the First World War? Why did the Nazi state systematically murder 6 million Jews? How did the implementation of Nazi plans for a “racial empire” affect the lives of millions of Europeans during the Second World War? And what is the legacy of the Third Reich, for Germany today? These are the primary questions addressed by this course.

Texts

• Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front 
• David F. Crew, Hitler and the Nazis. A History in Documents (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005)
•  J. Noakes and G. Pridham(editors), Nazism. A History in Documents and Eyewitness Accounts, 1919-1945 (University of Exeter Press Edition: Volumes 2 &3)
• Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz
• [You can find good time-lines for the history of Hitler’s rise to power, for World War II in Europe, and for the Holocaust on the Internet  at http://www.historyplace.com/index.html. Each chronology provides detailed information on selected subjects, and a large number of contemporary photographs.
• We are also going to be working with the documents and images at this web-site: http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/. ] 

Grading

Your general participation in class discussions (i.e. attendance + involvement) counts for 20% of the overall grade. The take-home mid-term document test (5-6 pages) is worth 20% of the final grade. There is no final exam per se but you will have a second take-home document test (5-6 pages) which is worth 20% of the final grade.. You will also be asked to write one short review of any one of the books by Remarque, or Levi (4-5 pages, 20% of final grade). Finally, you will be asked to write two  brief (2-3 page) analyses of the visual evidence(photographs, propaganda, election posters, etc.) that I will include among the class materials, or of recommended recent films on Nazi Germany. Each of these two assignments is worth 10% of the final grade.

Germany in the Twentieth Century
HIS 337N/LAH 350/REE 335
Unique #: 29700
TTH 3:30-5:00 GAR 0.120

THE PURPOSE OF THE COURSE:
        Hitler and the Nazis have given twentieth-century Germany a world-historical significance it would otherwise have lacked. Even from our vantage point, the Nazi regime is still one of the most dramatic and destructive episodes in western European, indeed, in world history. Nazism is synonymous with terror, concentration camps and mass murder. Hitler's war claimed the lives of tens of millions and left Europe in complete ruins. The danger resides in the temptation to view all of German history from the end of the nineteenth-century onwards as merely the pre-history of Nazism, thereby failing to deal with each period on its own terms. And what do we do with the more than half a century of German history since 1945? With the defeat of  Nazi Germany in 1945, the course of German history appears to have experienced a radical break. New political and social systems were imposed upon the two halves of the divided Germany by the victors. The hostilities of the Cold War appeared to ensure a permanent division of Germany, which in 1961 assumed a compelling symbolic form, the Berlin Wall. But in 1989, the dramatic changes in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe revolutionized East Germany as well. The Berlin Wall came down, East and West Germany were once again joined together in one nation. What exactly this newest version of the German nation will look like in ten or twenty years is still unclear. 
 
    In the first half of the course, we will begin by discussing the origins and effects of  World War One(1914-1918), then move on to the German Revolution(1918-1919) and the Weimar Republic(l9l8-l933), the Nazi regime (1933-1945) and the Holocaust. The questions we will focus on here are: Was Germany’s first experiment with democracy between 1918 and 1933 doomed to failure? What factors contributed to the rise of Nazism and how did the Nazi regime affect Germany and Europe? Were all vestiges of Nazism destroyed in 1945? In the second half of the semester we will discuss the history of  Germany in the Cold War(1945-1989). We will end by talking about the consequences of the end of the Cold War and the fall of the Berlin Wall (1989 to the present). Here, the main questions will be: Did, West and East Germany follow fundamentally new paths? What clues can be found in the histories of the Federal Republic in West Germany and the German Democratic Republic in East Germany since 1949 that may indicate the possibilities for change in the future? How does the unification of East and West Germany affect Germany's future role in Europe and the world?
 
Required Reading:
Mary Fullbrook,The Divided Nation
Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front
Richard Bessel(ed)Life in the Third Reich
Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz
Peter Schneider, The Wall Jumper
Please also make sure to bookmark the following web-site. We will be working extensively with materials on this site: http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/
 
Assignments/Grading:

This course combines lectures and discussions of secondary readings as well as original historical documents (short selections) and contemporary visual materials such as photographs, newsreels, propaganda and election posters. The writing assignments are designed to allow you to think and write about each of these different ways of gaining access to the German past. There will be no formal mid-term or final exam. Plus/minus grades will be assigned for the final grade. This class is a Significant Writing Component Course (SWC). The writing requirements are:
 
(1)Two longer essay assignments (each 6-8 pages typewritten, each worth 30% of your final grade) which ask you to think critically about some of the major issues in twentieth century German history. The first assignment will deal with the period up to 1939. The second will focus on the period from 1939 to the present. Essay 1 will be due on October 30. Essay 2 is due no later than the official exam date for this course, December 9. You must submit one rough draft of each of these essays.
 
(2)In addition to these two longer essay assignments, you will be asked to write one shorter essay (4-5 pages typewritten­worth 20% of the final grade) on any one of the books by  Remarque, Bessel, Levi, or Schneider. This is not a book report. I will hand out specific questions on each of these books which you need to answer in your essays. You must submit one rough draft of this assignment. Due Dates listed on syllabus
 
(3)Finally, you will be asked to write two  short (2-3 page) analyses of the original documents, or  visual evidence(photographs, propaganda, election posters, etc.) that I will include among the class handouts, or  internet sites on twentieth century Germany, or current media discussions of modern German history that you yourself have found(each of these 2 assignments is worth 10% of the final grade). You must submit one rough draft of each of these essays. Due Dates: any time during the semester but no later than the official exam date for this course, December 9.
 
 
Schedule of Lectures, Reading Assignments and Discussions [1]:
 
Class Dates                                    Topics                                             Assignment/ Readings
August 26                                        Introduction
September 1 & 3                              The New Nation:
                 Imperial Germany, 1871-1914     
 
September 8 & 10                              World War One, 1914-1918
Discussion of Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front, Tuesday, Sept.11 ; essay on this book due October 6
 
September 15 & 17                        Defeat, Revolution and the Weimar Republic, 1918-24                    
     Fullbrook,Ch.1-2
September 22 & 24                        Weimar Culture
 
September 29 & October 1          The Great Depression and the End of Weimar       Fullbrook, Ch.3
 
October  6 & 8                               The Rise of Nazism                                              
 
October  13 & 15                           The Nazi State,1933-39                                         Fullbrook, Ch.4-5
 
October  20 & 22                            Nazism and German Society,1933-39
Discussion of Bessel, Life in the Third Reich, October 22, essay on this book due November 5
 
October 27 & 29                             World War Two
 
November 3 & 5                              The Holocaust
Film "Night and Fog"/in-class discussion of Levi, Survival in Auschwitz, Nov. 5; essay due November 19
November 10 & 12                          Occupation and Reconstruction             Fullbrook,Ch.6-7
 

November  17 & 19                        The Two Germanies after 1945      Fullbrook,Ch.8-9. Discussion of Peter Schneider, The Wall Jumper , essay due no later than the official final exam date, December 9.
 
November 24                                The Two Germanys after 1945               Fullbrook, Ch.10-12
 
December 1 & 3                            German Unification, 1989-present          Fullbrook, Ch.13-14+Film: “Good-Bye Lenin”   
 
 
                 [ DECEMBER 4 ---LAST CLASS DAY ]


Please note: Students with disabilities may request appropriate academic accommodations from the Division of Diversity and Community Engagement, Services for Students with Disabilities, 471-6259.
 
 

[1] .I will be lecturing in each class period. Class discussions of assigned readings (other than Fulbrook which is the basic text for the course) will take place on the dates scheduled.

Description: Despite the many calamities it caused and experienced in the twentieth century, the German state has persisted into our present as a leader in European politics, economy and society and an important international actor. To understand why this would be the case, this course treats the history of Germany in the “long” twentieth century, that is, from the intermediate background of WWI and the establishment of a unified German Empire (1871) to the present. Class time will alternate between lecture and discussion of primary source readings. Topics to be covered include: German economy, geography, and demography; national unification; German colonialism; Wilhelmine society and culture; the social and political status of German Jewry; the background, causes, and experience of WWI; the failed Communist Revolution of 1919; the emergence and decline of the Weimar state; the economic crisis of the interwar years; Weimar culture; National Socialism and the Third Reich; the experience and effects of WWII; the Holocaust; the constitution of East and West German states, societies, and cultures; the “economic miracle”; the Cold War in Germany; 1968 and its social effects; the revolutions of 1989; reunification; the experience of non-Germans in Germany since 1945; and Germany in the European Union. Where possible we will consider these themes in global context. Throughout, emphasis will fall on the reading and interpretation of primary sources in English translation, including text, film, photographs, and music.

Possible readings (selections – please consult the instructor for the final reading list before purchasing any items):

Stefan Zweig, The World of Yesterday; Ernst Jünger, Storms of Steel; Erich Maria Remarque, The Road Back; Fritz Stern, Five Germanys I Have Known; Kaes et al., The Weimar Republic Sourcebook (selections); Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf; Peter Fritzsche, Germans into Nazis; Arthur Koestler, The God that Failed; J.M. Keynes, The Economic Consequences of the Peace; Filip Müller, Eyewitness Auschwitz; Jana Hensel, After the Wall.

Probable grading scheme:

Map quiz=5%; Midterm 25%; Final exam 25%; Short paper 30%; other quizzes 15%.

May be repeated for credit when the topics vary.

Prerequisite: Graduate standing and consent of the graduate adviser.

Restricted to students in the Normandy Scholars Program. Application deadline was October 4, 2010; enrollment is closed.

How was an obscure, unemployed Austrian, who never rose above the rank of corporal in the German army, able to become the leader of a mass political movement which overthrew the most democratic political system Germany had ever known? Why did Germany begin the most devastating and brutal war in world history just two decades after having lost the First World War? Why did the Nazi state systematically murder 6 million Jews? How did the implementation of Nazi plans for a “racial empire” affect the lives of millions of Europeans during the Second World War? And what is the legacy of the Third Reich, for Germany today? These are the primary questions addressed by this course.

Texts

• Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front 
• David F. Crew, Hitler and the Nazis. A History in Documents (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005)
•  J. Noakes and G. Pridham(editors), Nazism. A History in Documents and Eyewitness Accounts, 1919-1945 (University of Exeter Press Edition: Volumes 2 &3)
• Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz
• [You can find good time-lines for the history of Hitler’s rise to power, for World War II in Europe, and for the Holocaust on the Internet  at http://www.historyplace.com/index.html. Each chronology provides detailed information on selected subjects, and a large number of contemporary photographs.
• We are also going to be working with the documents and images at this web-site: http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/. ] 

Grading

Your general participation in class discussions (i.e. attendance + involvement) counts for 20% of the overall grade. The take-home mid-term document test (5-6 pages) is worth 20% of the final grade. There is no final exam per se but you will have a second take-home document test (5-6 pages) which is worth 20% of the final grade.. You will also be asked to write one short review of any one of the books by Remarque, or Levi (4-5 pages, 20% of final grade). Finally, you will be asked to write two  brief (2-3 page) analyses of the visual evidence(photographs, propaganda, election posters, etc.) that I will include among the class materials, or of recommended recent films on Nazi Germany. Each of these two assignments is worth 10% of the final grade.