INTERNATIONAL HOLOCAUST CONFERENCE:
Silence, Speech, Memory, Message, Understanding – AFTER 75 YEARS

2019, November 14th – 16th.
Martin-Luther-University Halle-Wittenberg, Germany

This conference invites papers on the latest developments in Holocaust research, especially in relation to contemporary political and cultural trends in Europe. These include the rise of right-wing governments, of nationalist and racist discourses, and Holocaust revisionism and denial, in the context of greater emphasis being placed on the use of new technology in memorialisation and education as we face the end of the survivor generation.
We will ask what the practical and theoretical implications are for Holocaust research and education in the light of these new trends, and how the work of researchers, museologists, teachers and others can attempt to answer back to their negative political implications.
We welcome abstracts from scholars, students, professionals, teachers and others working in any relevant field, including history, philosophy, politics, journalism, anthropology, linguistics, archaeology, history of art, religious studies, literature and film, as well as professionals from museums, memorials and archives, school-teachers and creative writers and artists.
Our concern will be with the spheres of family memory, public discourse and historiography, and the changes that have occurred in these realms since 1945. We will analyse the relationship of the Holocaust’s legacy to national memory in countries both within and outside the European Union, those which underwent Nazi occupation (such as Poland, Hungary, the former Czechoslovakia and the territories of Ukraine, Moldova and Romania), and those which were not occupied but fought against the Nazis and took in Jewish exiles and refugees (including Britain, Canada, the USA and present-day Israel). We will consider how such occurrences as the Cold War, its post-1989 aftermath, civil war in the former Yugoslavia, and the contemporary refugee crisis can be viewed in relation to the Holocaust, as well as other genocides that have since taken place in Africa and Asia.
The conference is a designed as a continuation of discussions held at the 2016 National Holocaust Conference at the University of Szeged in Hungary, now offering the chance for scholars to compare findings with those from other national contexts.
The conference will be held at the Faculty of Philosophy II (Humanities, Modern Philologies, Comparative Literature) and in cooperation with Middle and East European Studies (Aleksander Brückner Centre for Polish Studies) of the Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg.
The conference will be organized in cooperation with the Faculty of Philosophy II (Humanities, Modern Philologies, Comparative Literature of the Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg (Prof. Werner Nell), the Comparative Literary Department of the University of Szeged, Hungary (Prof. Zoltán Kelemen), the School of English of the University of Sheffield, UK (Prof. Sue Vice), the Department of Modern Languages, Literatures, and Cultures, Queen‘s University, Kingston/Ontario, Canada and the Aleksander Brückner Centre for Polish Studies (Prof. Yvonne Kleinmann), supported by Professor Thomas Bremer (Romanistik Department, Martin-Luther-Universität).

Abstracts of around 250 words, with a brief biography, should be sent to Dr Werner Nell at the email address below, by 15 February 2019:
Werner.nell@germanistik.uni-halle.de
Prof. Dr. Werner Nell, Chair of Comparative Literature, Martin-Luther-University Halle Wittenberg; Department of Modern Languages, Literatures, and Cultures, Queen‘s University at Kingston, Ontario Canada.
15. 01. 2019