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- All Subjects: Holocaust
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- Creators: Benkert, Volker
- Creators: Rothenberg, Daniel
- Member of: Theses and Dissertations
Description
In the sixty-seven years following the end of World War II, West Germany and Japan underwent a remarkable series of economic and social changes that irrevocably altered their respective ways of life. Formerly xenophobic, militaristic and highly socially stratified societies, both emerged from the 20th Century as liberal, prosperous and free. Both made great strides well beyond the expectations of their occupiers, and rebounded from the overwhelming destruction of their national economies within a few short decades. While these changes have yielded dramatic results, the wartime period still looms large in their respective collective memories. Therefore, an ongoing and diverse dialectical process would engage the considerable popular, official, and intellectual energy of their post-war generations. In West Germany, the term Vergangenheitsbewältigung (VGB) emerged to describe a process of coming to terms with the past, while the Japanese chose kako no kokufuku to describe their similar historical sojourns. Although intellectuals of widely varying backgrounds in both nations made great strides toward making Japanese and German citizens cognizant of the roles that their militaries played in gruesome atrocities, popular cinematic productions served to reiterate older, discredited assertions of the fundamental honor and innocence of the average soldier, thereby nurturing a historically revisionist line of reasoning that continues to compete for public attention. All forms of media would play an important role in sustaining this “apologetic narrative,” and cinema, among the most popular and visible of these mediums, was not excluded from this. Indeed, films would play a unique recurring role, like rhetorical time capsules, in offering a sanitized historical image of Japanese and German soldiers that continues to endure in modern times. Nevertheless, even as West Germany and Japan regained their sovereignty and re-examined their pasts with ever greater resolution and insight, their respective film industries continued to “reset” the clock, and accentuated the visibility and relevancy of apologetic forces still in existence within both societies. However, it is important to note that, when speaking of “Germans” and “Japanese,” that they are not meant to be thought of as being uniformly of one mind or another. Rather, the use of these words is meant as convenient shorthand to refer to the dominant forces in Japanese and German civil society at any given time over the course of their respective post- war histories. Furthermore, references to “Germany” during the Cold War period are to be understood to mean the Federal Republic of Germany, rather than their socialist counterpart, the German Democratic Republic, a nation that undertook its own coming to terms with the past in an entirely distinct fashion.
ContributorsPiscopo, Michael (Author) / Benkert, Volker (Thesis director) / Moore, Aaron (Committee member) / Machander, Sina (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (Contributor)
Created2012-12
Description
In the aftermath of the Second World War and global atrocities that occurred during the Nazi Holocaust, the international community established the United Nations and developed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The UN legally defined the term genocide with the development of the Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in an attempt to deter future genocides from occurring. These are now the governing documents for international human rights law and genocide prevention. Since the development of these documents, however, human rights violations and genocides have continued to occur around the world. In 1994, Rwandan Hutus murdered more than one million Tutsis in the span of one hundred days. Following the genocide, the United Nations developed the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in which the conviction of Jean-Paul Akayesu established the first trial where an international tribunal was called upon to interpret the definition of genocide as defined in the Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Although the human rights movement has created greater deterrence for human rights crimes, punished perpetrators for their crimes, and established norms for the treatment of human beings, global human rights violations and genocides continue to occur. This project attempts to explore the presence of possible factors in pre-genocidal nations that may predict whether a nation could spiral into genocide and what mechanisms could counter their presence.
ContributorsBabos, Kristina Rose (Author) / Haglund, LaDawn (Thesis director) / Rothenberg, Daniel (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor)
Created2014-05
Description
Though information warfare has been around for centuries, the advent of the Information Age has made this type of warfare increasingly utilized by both state and non-state actors to varying effects in conflicts across the world. Technological advances have ignited increases in computing power, information computerization, the proliferation of powerful information technology, and communication speeds. This study investigates Russian information warfare doctrine- specifically, the tactics employed in information warfare campaigns and the effects of such campaigns. The Russian hybrid warfare campaigns in Ukraine and Syria will serve as the focal case studies. I argue that Russian information warfare doctrine is inelastic, in that the core tactics used do not change in different conflicts. This study will dissect Russian information warfare principles, provide an overview of the Russian political objectives in both battlespaces, analyze the effectiveness of information warfare tactics when applied in two different engagement spheres, and will explore the reasons why the same tactics had different effects. The study finds that doctrinally identical information warfare tactics were used in both Ukraine and Syria. To provide further significance, the study discusses the policy implications that static Russian information warfare doctrine has regarding the future of information warfare in conflict.
ContributorsTran, Justin Namchuong (Author) / Rothenberg, Daniel (Thesis director) / Pagel, Bruce (Committee member) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor, Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-05
Description
I argue that the relationship between the United States and Israel has harmed the United States, the Palestinians, and the rest of the Middle East. For the United States section, I support this argument by discussing the corruption of AIPAC, national debt, anti-American sentiment in the Middle East, NSA spying and surveillance and the effects of the Iraq War. For the Palestinian section, I support this argument by discussing how the war crimes committed against the Palestinians are done with weapons supplied to Israel by the United States. Lastly, I go over how the rest of the Middle East is harmed by this by discussing how the Iraq War has affected the Iraqis there and how the Libyan regime change affected the people in Libya.
ContributorsPappusetti, Vamsi Krishna (Author) / Niebuhr, Robert (Thesis director) / Ahmad, Omaya (Committee member) / Rothenberg, Daniel (Committee member) / School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies (Contributor, Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-05
Description
During the 1970's to 90's, scholars in the fields of Jewish Studies, anthropology and sociology (notably, Hellen Epstein, Larry Langer and Yosef Yerushalmi), developed the idea of generational trauma theory, when analyzing the trauma inflicted upon European Jewish populations during the Holocaust. Epstein argues that trauma is passed down from generation to generation, while Langer argues that the second generation interprets the trauma in their own way. Other important terms in trauma theory include liturgical time, sites of memory, historical trauma and the historical trauma response. Scholars who analyze American Indian communities, like Yellow Horse Brave Heart and Durran/Durran, readily took up this theory, applying it to the Native American experience. One area where this theory has been applied to is the Native American Boarding School experience. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the efficacy of applying the post-Holocaust trauma theory to the Native American boarding school experience. In order to determine the effectiveness of the boarding schools, one must analyze the boarding school experience, beginning at the philosophical underpinnings of the boarding school, and then discussing the impacts that the boarding schools had on the students and finally, the impact that this had on the second generation. However, this approach has a number of flaws, such as the differences between native communities and post-Holocaust, American, Jewish communities, as discussed in the Philosophy of American Indian Studies. The length of the boarding schools was also longer than the length of the Holocaust. The fact that Native Americans faced repeated trauma, in a way that post-Holocaust American Jews did not. The trauma also changed for both native peoples and post-Holocaust Jews, making it difficult for there to be a single response to trauma. The philosophical bases of the Holocaust and boarding schools were also different. The post-Holocaust generational trauma approach also has a number of applications to native peoples. This includes the psychological aspect of trauma. The use of terminology by native scholars. Native peoples also developed concepts like sites of memory and liturgical time. Finally, both the post-Holocaust Jewas and Native Americans have used trauma for political ends. The conclusion is that post-Holocaust generational trauma theory has some applications to native peoples, but the application is limited. A scholar must take into careful consideration the native peoples who they are working with.
ContributorsMongeau, Michael Philip (Author) / Benkert, Volker (Thesis director) / Riding In, James (Committee member) / School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies (Contributor) / American Indian Studies Program (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-12
Description
Turkish Safe Zones, as areas to push migrants into for protection, have always been contentious but the recent push to expel Syrians into The Northern Syria Buffer Zone (also known as the Safe Zone, Peace Corridor, or Security Mechanism) has added to the concern of international human rights violations in Turkey. In addition this paper considers the arguments made for the geographical limitation, of the The 1951 Refugee Convention, for refugees in Turkey as it pertains to the welfare of Syrian migrants. As justified under the geographic limitation in Turkey, sending Syrian migrants to Safe Zones is extremely dangerous because it not only puts peoples lives at risk, but it also sets the stage to accept that international law is not truly international and can be broken to avoid the responsibility of migrants. International law quite clearly shows how the forcible return of any migrant to an area where they are put in harm’s way is a direct violation of international law regardless of geographical limitations.Because the development of Turkish Safe Zones in Northern Syria is a recent development, much of the current political science literature fails to see the problem with the Turkish StateFs deportation. Instead, current literature (Abdelaaty, 2019, p. 1) (United Nations, 2011) (Blake, 2020) (Mann, 2021) focuses on how Syrian migrants are termed guests instead of refugees. The guest status makes it so migrants with refugee level concerns do not receive refugee level benefits. This paper argues that the Turkish state deportation of Syrian migrants to Safe Zones is morally wrong, but not surprising. Based on historical events, the expulsion of Syrians to Turkish safe zones in Syria is the logical next step for the Turkish state to legally displace the responsibility of taking care of minorities and migrants.
ContributorsRosenthal, Emily (Author) / Rothenberg, Daniel (Thesis director) / Niebuhr, Robert (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Watts College of Public Service & Community Solut (Contributor) / Dean, W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor)
Created2022-05
Description
In 1916, in the middle of the First World War, Britain developed and deployed the first military tanks on a battlefield, signifying a huge step forward in the combination of mechanization and the military. Tanks represented progress in technical and mechanical terms, but their introduction to military goals and military environments required the men involved to develop immaterial meanings for the tanks. Tactically, tanks required investment from tank commanders and non-tank commanders alike, and incorporating tanks into the everyday routine of the battlefront required men to accommodate these machines into their experiences and perspectives. Reporting the actions of the tanks impelled newspapers and reporters to find ways of presenting the tanks to a civilian audience, tying them to British perspectives on war and granting them positive associations. This thesis sought to identify major concepts and ideas as applied to the British tanks deployed on the Western Front in the First World War, and to better understand how British audiences, both military and civilian, understood and adopted the tank into their understanding of the war. Different audiences had different expectations of the tank, shaped by the environment in which they understood it, and the reaction of those audiences laid the foundation for further development of the tank.
ContributorsBartels, K'Tera (Author) / Jones, Christopher (Thesis advisor) / Benkert, Volker (Committee member) / Thompson, Victoria (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018
Description
Through the lens of a Jewish family in the early 20th century, histories of resilience, rescue, and resistance are shown. The Loewys were a Jewish family who migrated from Poland to Germany then France and ending up in the United States following World War II. In their travels they experienced many of which other Jewish experiences were, while also differentiating from the overall story. The family also experienced life as refugees and interns during the Holocaust. Arrested in Vichy following the Armistice between Germany and France, the Loewys were later granted their freedom which they used to help free others from the camp. One of the few stories of Jews rescuing Jews, the family began its life as resistors to the Vichy and German occupation. Participating in both passive and active resistance from 1940-1944, they witnessed the highs and lows of this new life. The end of the war saw the family make it to the United States beginning their next chapter as survivors of the Holocaust and the war. With the use of primary source material provided by the Loewys, along with scholarly work about the different periods, the story of the Loewys is one of resilience in the face of mounting adversity, rescuing of internes from camps, and resistance against an occupational force that furthers the research of the Jewish experience in the early 20th century.
ContributorsVance, Marc (Author) / Benkert, Volker (Thesis advisor) / Cichopek-Garaja, Anna (Committee member) / LePore, Paul (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020
Description
When the Warsaw Ghetto was demolished by German forces towards the end of World War II, there were few physical traces of the Ghetto left standing. As such, both historians and the public must look to other types of sources to understand what life and death were like for the inhabitants of the Ghetto, and how they have remembered their experiences within the Ghetto. These memories and representations of the Warsaw Ghetto can be found in memoir-style written works, and later, in films based on these works. This thesis will examine the ways in which the Warsaw Ghetto was represented by two authors who survived it, Władisław Szpilman and Marcel Reich-Ranicki, and how their memory of the Warsaw Ghetto is represented in the films based on their lives and survival, The Pianist, and Mein Leben: Marcel Reich-Ranicki.
ContributorsSmith, Erin Lianne (Author) / Benkert, Volker (Thesis advisor) / Cichopek-Gajraj, Anna (Committee member) / Gilfillan, Daniel (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020