OrderBackgroundSpecificationsNazi Propaganda Literature |
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Nazi Propaganda Literature
Nazi-German collections Although YIVO's importance is taken for granted by scholars in the Jewish Studies field, its large collection of Nazi-German publications about Jews, Judaism, and the "Jewish Question" is largely unknown. The Nazi-German collections came to YIVO in three stages: The first, and largest, part was donated to YIVO in the summer of 1945, the second part was received in 1979, and the third part - which included a high proportion of literary titles (lacking in the two previous gifts) - arrived in 1985. The vast majority of the collection dates from the Nazi period, although a substantial number of works were published during the Weimar Republic. Unique titles The significance of this collection lies not merely in its size, but also in the rarity - and in some cases, uniqueness - of many of the items it contains. Quite a few of the titles in the collection are difficult to find elsewhere, and several - as far as could be ascertained by the YIVO library staff - do not occur in any other North American collection. Examples of works in this latter category are a 74-page booklet titled Der Generalbezirk Charkiw, published in 1942 by the Reichskommissariat Ukraine (marked "nur für den Dienstgebrauch"), and the 62-page booklet SS-Mann und Blutsfrage, published by the SS-Hauptamt during the war. Nazi research on Jews and Judaism That this collection can support research into a wide variety of topics is self-evident. Nevertheless, it would be useful to emphasize a few areas in which the collection could prove particularly valuable. First, despite the existence of a huge body of scholarship about the persecution and murder of Jews by Nazi Germany, the broad topic of Nazi research on Jews and Judaism has not been subjected to much systematic investigation. Surprisingly little has been done to augment Weinreich's Hitler's Professors, which was published in 1946, while the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials were still being held. Max Weinreich - the distinguished Yiddishist and linguistic scholar who then served as YIVO's Research Director - based his research largely upon the books received immediately after World War II. Anti-Semitic scholarship Although the extensive scholarship about higher education in Nazi Germany contains numerous references to the role of German academics in promoting anti-Semitism, with few exceptions little attention has been paid to the actual content and methodology of anti-Semitic scholarship. The YIVO library contains much of this Nazi scholarship - in both book and periodical format - in a single, user-friendly collection, of which the major portion (excluding the serials) is here reproduced on microfilm. Knapsack books Knapsack books are Wehrmacht and SS publications intended as indoctrination for the common soldier. Scholars investigating the extent and impact of ideological indoctrination in the Wehrmacht and SS will likely find much of interest in the collection's numerous knapsack books. Although the contents of these books are in most cases predictable, there are some surprises. For example, one book that purports to document the historicity of ritual murder accusations against Jews right into the twentieth century, concludes with the observation that the Jews had brought upon themselves the "radikale Vernichtung des Judentums" (radical extermination of Jewry) that was now taking place. How common were such open references to the Final Solution in the literature distributed to German soldiers? A systematic analysis of this genre of publication might shed further light not only on how widespread knowledge of the Final Solution actually was, but also on the propaganda strategies employed by the Wehrmacht and other agencies for rationalizing such policies. Photographs and drawings Yet another avenue of scholarly inquiry that might benefit from the YIVO microfilmed Nazi collection is the study of the visual representations of Jews. A large number of the items in the collection are illustrated with photographs and drawings, ranging from virulent Stürmer-style caricatures to more insidious representations executed in the manner of an ostensibly scientific anthropology. The YIVO Institute The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research is the world's most important center for the study of East European Jewry, Yiddish literature and culture, and the experience of East European Jewish immigrants in the United States. Founded in 1925 in Vilnius (Vilna), a city that at the time was one of the leading centers of Jewish learning, YIVO has been based in New York since 1940. In 1999, it moved to a new home at the Center for Jewish History at 15 West 16th Street (New York, NY 10011), a facility that also houses the Leo Baeck Institute (which focuses on German Jewry), the American Jewish Historical Society, the Yeshiva University Museum, and the American Sephardi Federation. Alan E. Steinweis, Ph.D., University of Nebraska-Lincoln |
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