Date and Time: Sunday, December 20th at 1100 MST
Location: Zoom Meeting. Mitch sent meeting info by email on 11/25/2020.
Please email materials to Mitch by 12/11 so he can post them to this blog.
This should be an interesting topic, especially with two members of our banter group residing in Germany. It is timely, as well. At the risk of over-dramatically comparing the ravages of post-war Germany to the U.S. today, there may be some parallels and lessons that could be learned about bringing a divided nation together (before war starts and reconstruction is needed).
The focus of this topic isn't so much about rebuilding cities from rubble, the Marshall Plan, the way that Germany was divided by the Allied Nations or, even, the disease, hunger, and economic issues that the German people suffered. Nor is the topic about pre-war Germany and how Hitler could have risen to power with the support of such a large portion of the German populace. Those concepts may weave into the discussion, to some extent, but, as I understand it, the intent is to look for materials on, research, and discuss how Germany, more or less, succeed in a post-war societal and cultural reconstruction.
How did the German people come together and build a nation with a new community, a new culture and new socio-political beliefs after the war? When and how did those that supported the Nazi Party come around to recognize that they were the 'baddies'? How did those that made the switch more quickly deal with the underground Nazi resistance? What was the guilt like for those that always opposed the war but were afraid to speak up? Most importantly, what was it like for German family, friends, and neighbors, all in different stages of grief, acceptance and denial, with different opinions on the future of the nation, when they gathered around the post-war dinner table?
From Kirk B.
The German recovery from the Nazi period is a very interesting topic and has to be looked at from many angles, especially the differences between East and West Germany. As I understand it, Neo-nazi groups are re-emerging in the East where the economy is weak, but not so much in the West where the economy is much stronger.
When we had the baby boom Germany had the opposite. It was predicted that this would lead to an economic collapse. The opposite happened proving the economic experts were wrong. Expensive labor was an asset, because it forced Germany and Japan to be more efficient.
From Sabine
Leave it to the German language to give us a single word to summarize this complicated topic: Vergangenheitsbewältigung.
It is the German term for efforts to deal publicly with the Nazi past.
Sabine recommends reading Wikipedia's overview on the word here (link).
Here are some more materials from Sabine:
Note: The links to the two papers, above, will take you to a webpage where you can read them in your browser or, if you prefer, look for the download icon in the upper right where you can save it to your computer as a .pdf document.
From Isaac:
I'm
thinking the aftermath of world war one might be a somewhat more
relevant time period? And the questions posed at the end are exactly
addressed by Sabine's mr. Rogers video:
Also
pre-World War II, but I'm really interested especially in hearing what
our current residents of Germany think of this. And again, it seems
awfully relevant to the question of how to deal with the present moment
I
mean, I'm interested in what everyone thinks about it, and I'm
especially curious what residents of Germany have heard relevant to this
while living there.
From Mitch:
I'm going to take publisher's privilege here and post a silly placeholder, for now. After I've had a chance to read Sabine's posts and do some research I may find something to post with some more depth. In the meantime, I am submitting a short segment from the BBC's 'That Mitchell and Webb Show'. It is quite well known so, I'd imagine, that many have already seen it....just the first thing that came to mind when the topic was proposed. Here is the less than three minute comedy sketch (link) of Nazi's having a sudden battlefield epiphany. I'd imagine that the civilian German population went through a similar (albeit, slower) realization in the days and weeks after V-E Day.
