Coming to Terms with the Holocaust, Part 2: The Holocaust Begins

As the most extensively documented genocide in history--and the most intensively investigated, interrogated, and debated--the Holocaust in Europe (1933-1945) has much to teach us about hatred, demagoguery, impersonal violence, state-sponsored murder on an industrial scale, and ourselves. In this course, we complete our broad overview of the Holocaust. We trace the tangled path that led from exclusionary Nazi Antisemitism to Einsatzgruppen murder squads and, inevitably, gas chambers. We investigate the ghettoization of the Jews of Eastern Europe, the radical and far-reaching decisions at the Wannsee Conference, and the establishment of the five concentration camps. And we study the creation and operation of Auschwitz and conclude with an interrogation of the Nuremberg trials. This course will be recorded. Students will have access to videos for the duration of the course.