CALL FOR PAPERS
Beyond camps and forced labour: current international research on survivors of Nazi persecution. Sixth international multidisciplinary conference, to be held at Birkbeck, University of London, and Wiener Library, London, 10-12 January 2018
In memory of David Cesarani
This conference is planned as a follow-up to the five successful conferences, which took place at Imperial War Museum London in 2003, 2006, 2009, 2012 and 2015. It will continue to build on areas previously investigated, and also open up new fields of academic enquiry.
The aim is to bring together scholars from a variety of disciplines who are engaged in research on all groups of survivors of Nazi persecution. These will include - but are not limited to - Jews, Roma and Sinti, Slavonic peoples, Jehovah’s Witnesses, homosexuals, Soviet prisoners of war, political dissidents, members of underground movements, the disabled, the so-called ‘racially impure’, and forced labourers. For the purpose of the conference, a ‘survivor’ is defined as anyone who suffered any form of persecution by the Nazis or their allies as a result of the Nazis’ racial, political, ideological or ethnic policies from 1933 to 1945, and who survived the Second World War.
The organisers welcome proposals, which focus on topics and themes of the ‘life after’, ranging from the experience of liberation to the trans-generational impact of persecution, individual and collective memory and consciousness, and questions of theory and methodology.
In response to recent scholarly debate and feedback we have received from the last conference, for this sixth conference we are keen to encourage papers on:
- Comparative experiences of Jewish and non-Jewish survivors
- Jewish returnees from the Soviet Union
- Research on Holocaust education
- Literary representation of survival
As previously, we also warmly welcome new research in the following areas:
- DPs in post-war Europe
- Former forced labourers in central, east and south-east Europe
- Relief and rehabilitation
- Reception and resettlement
- Survivors in ‘grey zones’, including kapos
- Soviet and other prisoners of war
- The legacy of euthanasia and medical experiments
- Exiles, émigrés and refugees in the reconstruction process
- Rescuers and liberators
- Child survivors
- Gender and survival
- Physical and psychological consequences
- Trials and justice
- Reparation and restitution
- Film, photography and other visual representations
- Memory and testimony
- Museums and memorials
- Archives and record-building
Panel proposals are welcome.
We particularly encourage early career scholars and PhD candidates as well as colleagues from central, east and south-east Europe to apply; and we are pleased to announce that the Toni Schiff Memorial Fund and the foundation Remembrance, Responsibility and Future will support a number of speakers in specific areas of research with travel grants.
Please send an abstract of 200-250 words together with biographical background of 50-100 words by 31 March 2017 to Dieter Steinert: j.d.steinert@wlv.ac.uk
All proposals are subject to a review process.
Fees: GBP85 for speakers. The fee includes admission to all panels and evening events, lunches and refreshments during the conference. Further information and registration details will be made available in due time.
The conference is being organised by:
Suzanne Bardgett, Imperial War Museums, London
Ben Barkow, Wiener Library, London
David Feldman, Pears Institute for the study of Antisemitism, Birkbeck, University of London
Jessica Reinisch, Birkbeck, University of London
Christine Schmidt, Wiener Library, London
Johannes-Dieter Steinert, University of Wolverhampton
Dan Stone, Royal Holloway, University of London