Lydia M. Olson Library Atrium
Looking beyond solemn statements and well-meant monuments, Andrew I. Port will discuss his new book, Never Again, which looks at how the Holocaust shaped German responses to modern-day genocides in other countries after 1945. He will also discuss how these foreign atrocities recast Germany’s understanding of its own horrific history. Three Northern Michigan University professors, Robbie Goodrich (History), Petra Hendrickson (Political Science), and Anna Zimmer (Languages, Literatures, and International Studies) will serve as discussants.
Never Again: Germans and Genocide After the Holocaust
Andrew I. Port is Professor of History at Wayne State University. A leading scholar of modern Germany, Port is the author of Conflict and Stability in the German Democratic Republic, and former editor of the flagship journal Central European History. Dr. Port has won numerous prizes and fellowships, including the DAAD Prize for Distinguished Scholarship in German and European Studies.
Robbie Goodrich is a professor of History. His interests lie in Modern Central European history with a broad, integrative approach. His research and teaching emphasize cultural and social history and the interplay of factors such as labor, gender, sexuality, and religion in identity construction, which requires a comparative view of European and American experiences, reflected in his interest in transnational history and recent focus on questions of identity related to Austro-Hungarian migration to, from and through Michigan. Related to genocide studies, his recent work Democracy in Crisis: Germany, 1929-32 (UNC Press - 2023) looks at the causes of the demise of the German Weimar Republic.
Petra Hendrickson is an assistant professor of political Science. She teaches classes related to all aspects of international politics. Her research focuses on factors influencing genocide and politicide occurrence as well as how cases of mass killing are depicted in mass culture.
Anna Zimmer is an associate professor of German whose research examines the forms and functions of memory—especially of the Second World War—as presented in German-language novels that prominently figure violent conflicts and wars since 1990, including the Rwandan civil war, the dissolution of Yugoslavia, the NATO mission in Kosovo, 9/11, and the Iraq War.
This event is made possible by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and the American Library Association with co-sponsorships by the Department of History, the Department of Political Science, the Department of Languages, Literatures & International Studies, and the Department of Philosophy.