Christiane Wienand - Böcker

Reverberations of Nazi Violence in Germany and Beyond explores the complex and diverse reverberations of the Second World War after 1945. It focuses on the legacies that National Socialist violence and genocide perpetrated in Europe continue to have in German-speaking countries and communities, as well as among those directly affected by occupation, terror and mass murder. Furthermore it explores how those legacies are in turn shaped by the present.The volume also considers conflicting, unexpected and often dissonant interpretations and representations of these events, made by those who were the witnesses, victims and perpetrators at the time and also by different communities in the generations that followed. The contributions, from a range of disciplinary perspectives, enrich our understanding of the complexity of the ways in which a disturbing past continues to disrupt the present and how the past is in turn disturbed and instrumentalized by a later present.

Reverberations of Nazi Violence in Germany and Beyond explores the complex and diverse reverberations of the Second World War after 1945. It focuses on the legacies that National Socialist violence and genocide perpetrated in Europe continue to have in German-speaking countries and communities, as well as among those directly affected by occupation, terror and mass murder. Furthermore it explores how those legacies are in turn shaped by the present.The volume also considers conflicting, unexpected and often dissonant interpretations and representations of these events, made by those who were the witnesses, victims and perpetrators at the time and also by different communities in the generations that followed. The contributions, from a range of disciplinary perspectives, enrich our understanding of the complexity of the ways in which a disturbing past continues to disrupt the present and how the past is in turn disturbed and instrumentalized by a later present.

Provides the first comprehensive analysis of the history of returning German POWs after the Second World War, explored as a history of memory both during Germany's division and after unification.Millions of former German soldiers (known as Heimkehrer, literally "homecomers," or returnees) returned from captivity as prisoners of war at the end of the Second World War, an experience that had profound effects on German society and touched almost every German family. Based on extensive archival research and oral history interviews, this book provides the first comprehensive analysis of the history of the German returnees, explored as a historyof memory, both during Germany's division and after unification. At its core lies the question of how the experiences of war captivity were transformed into individual and collective memories. The book argues that memory of the experience of captivity and return is complex and multilayered and has been shaped by postwar political and social frameworks.Christiane Wienand is a historian and works in Heidelberg, Germany. She holds a PhD in Historyfrom University College London.