Discourses, Knowledge, and Disbelief in the Reich and Beyond

doi:10.1017/9781108990158.012

9 - Discourses, Knowledge, and Disbelief in the Reich and Beyond

from Part I - Structures, Players, and Processes

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 May 2025

Frank Bajohr and

Felix Berge

Edited by

Mary Fulbrook and

Jürgen Matthäus

Show author details

Mary Fulbrook: Affiliation:
University College London
Jürgen Matthäus: Affiliation:
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Book contents

Get access

Summary

This chapter traces the basic evolution of narratives/rumors about the Holocaust within relevant countries and organizations (the Red Cross, Jewish organizations); elaborates on the “Jewish question” as a tool in Nazi propaganda and diplomacy; discusses the integrative function of knowledge within German society for the Nazi regime; lists impediments against perception of the genocidal reality inside and outside the Reich; discusses the role of postwar trials for shaping public and scholarly discourse; and considers the effects of media-driven representation of the Holocaust for current understanding of perpetration.

Keywords

Holocaust narratives Jewish Question Nazi propaganda postwar trials

Information

Type: Chapter
Information: The Cambridge History of the Holocaust , pp. 217 - 237

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108990158.012 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2025

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Book purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Select Bibliography

Bajohr, F. and Pohl, D., Der Holocaust als offenes Geheimnis: Die Deutschen, die NS-Führung und die Alliierten (Munich, C. H. Beck, 2006).Google Scholar

Breitman, R., Official Secrets: What the Nazis Planned, What the British and Americans Knew (New York, Hill & Wang, 1998).Google Scholar

Dörner, B., Heimtücke: Das Gesetz als Waffe: Kontrolle, Abschreckung und Verfolgung in Deutschland 1933–1945 (Paderborn, Ferdinand Schöningh, 1998).Google Scholar

Dörner, B., Die Deutschen und der Holocaust: Was niemand wissen wollte, aber jeder wissen konnte (Berlin, Propyläen Verlag, 2007).Google Scholar

Hesse, K. and Springer, P., Vor aller Augen: Fotodokumente des nationalsozialistischen Terrors in der Provinz (Essen, Klartext, 2002).Google Scholar

Johnson, E. A. and Reuband, K.-H., What We Knew: Terror, Mass Murder, and Everyday Life in Nazi Germany. An Oral History (Cambridge, MA, Basic Books, 2005).Google Scholar

Kessel, M., Gewalt und Gelächter: “Deutschsein” 1914–1945 (Stuttgart, Franz Steiner, 2019).CrossRef Google Scholar

Kulka, O. and Jäckel, E. (eds.), The Jews in the Secret Nazi Reports on Popular Opinion in Germany, 1933–1945 (New Haven, Yale University Press, 2010), with CD-ROM.Google Scholar

Lipstadt, D., Beyond Belief: The American Press and the Coming of the Holocaust 1933–1945 (New York and London, Free Press, 1986).Google Scholar

Longerich, P., “Davon haben wir nichts gewusst!”: Die Deutschen und die Judenverfolgung 1933–1945 (Munich, Siedler Verlag, 2006).Google Scholar

Manoschek, W. (ed.), “Es gibt nur eines für das Judentum: Vernichtung”: Das Judenbild in deutschen Soldatenbriefen 1939–1944 (Hamburg, Hamburger Edition, 1995).Google Scholar

Obenaus, H. and Obenaus, S. (eds.), “Schreiben, wie es wirklich war!”: Aufzeichnungen Karl Dürkefäldens aus den Jahren 1933–1945 (Hanover, Fackelträger, 1985).Google Scholar

Schrafstetter, S. and Steinweis, A. E. (eds.), The Germans and the Holocaust: Popular Responses to the Persecution and Murder of the Jews (New York, Berghahn Books, 2016).Google Scholar

Stargardt, N., The German War: A Nation under Arms, 1939–1945 (New York, Basic Books, 2015).Google Scholar

Wildt, M., Hitler’s Volksgemeinschaft and the Dynamics of Racial Exclusion: Violence against Jews in Provincial Germany, 1919–1939, trans. B. Heise (New York, Berghahn Books, 2014 [2007]).Google Scholar