HGS 365 - Special Topics in Holocaust

May be repeated for credit

FALL 2021- DESIRING MEMORIALS: AFTERLIVES OF MASS VIOLENCE AND THE PURSUIT OF JUSTICE

Historians claim that we live in a golden age of memorials. But what do memorials want? And what do we want from memorials? Are memorials an expression of healing after violent events such as slavery, the Holocaust, World Wars, genocides and other forms of mass killings? Or are memorials a reminder that the experience of violence requires further healing and engagement in order to achieve justice? What is past and what does live on after mass violence, especially for the affected societies? In this course we will explore how memorials, but also monuments, museums and other built artefacts are situated in a complex field of law, political promises and ethical aspirations after violent events. As part of our exploration we will ask how memorials are built in the first place and with what political rationale. Further, this course asks what kind of architectural shape memorials take and where they are publicly placed, and for what purpose. Relatedly, we will inquire how commemoration is practiced on memorial sites and how this consolidates and shapes religious, ethnic, and racial groups and their collective memories nationally and transnationally.

Anticipated Terms Offered: Varies