Holocaust Memory and its Discontents: The Case of Germany, Featuring Michael Rothberg

In this lecture, Michael Rothberg will trace the rise of what became known as the “German model” of addressing a nation’s own crimes. While a few years ago it seemed obvious that countries like the United States could “learn from the Germans” to confront their troubled pasts (in Susan Neiman’s terms), today the situation seems more complicated.

Focusing especially on the Federal Republic of Germany, Rothberg will survey state-level engagements with National Socialism and the Holocaust as well as grassroots efforts at commemoration that began in the 1980s. He will show how the model of Vergangenheitsbewältigung (“coming to terms with” or “mastering” the past) was consolidated after German unification and then started to fray in the twenty-first century. He will conclude by emphasizing how migration, colonialism, and the October 7/Gaza moment intersect with — and have come to unsettle — German Holocaust memory.

This event is offered both in person at Geisel Library and virtually via Zoom.