Nazi Archives - Public Seminar

Democracy

The Showdown Between Democracy and Autocracy

Why the broad anti-Trump coalition must prepare for a post-election crisis

October 29, 2020 • by Claudia Koonz

Could democracy in the United States die? A number of troubling signs, such as Donald Trump’s refusal to endorse a peaceful transfer of power and his refusal to condemn white supremacists, lead many to worry about what has, until recently, been unthinkable. As a historian of Nazi Germany, I share this ...

The Showdown Between Democracy and Autocracy

Feature

Collective Amnesia in Post-Communist Poland

Why history, not memory or mythology, is the path to Polish-Jewish reconciliation

June 14, 2019 • by Magda Teter

After WWII, many European countries engaged in what some scholars dubbed “collective amnesia.” Austria, for example, began to redefine itself as the first victim of the Nazis. France amplified the Resistance, forgetting about its Vichy days; Western Germany, after the trials of several high-profile Nazi leaders, allowed for silence to ...

Feature

Jews and Poles

Together for 800 Years But Not Together

September 13, 2018 • by Isaac Bashevis Singer

Why is this? – Alienation rather than hatred. – A time when Jews were virtually the only intellectuals in Poland. – Why assimilation was impossible. – The modern Jew and the modern Pole. Several weeks ago, Stanisław Mikołajczyk – Prime Minister of the Polish government-in-exile – stated that there were still ...

Feature

Unite the Right #2

Rally in DC doesn’t even unite the counter-protestors

August 18, 2018 • by Jo Freeman

When Unite the Right announced it would hold a rally across from the White House on the August 12 anniversary of its 2017 rally in Charlottesville VA, it caused a lot of consternation. Violence had permeated the 2017 event, resulting in the death of a counter protestor. Several organizations and coalitions ...