The Future of the Holocaust: Between History and Memory - Hardcover

Berel Lang

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0801435889 ISBN 13: 9780801435881

Publisher: Cornell University Press, 1999

Synopsis

In The Future of the Holocaust, Berel Lang continues his inquiry into the causal mechanisms of decision-making and conduct in Nazi Germany and into responses to the genocide by individuals and nations―an inquiry that he began in Act and Idea in the Nazi Genocide and pursued in Heidegger's Silence. Raising the question now of what the future of the Holocaust is, he addresses among other topics how history and memory together shape views of the Holocaust; how the concept of "intention"―which played a crucial part in the events of half a century ago―shapes history and memory themselves; and how future views of this genocide may alter those of today.

In addition, Lang explores cultural representations of the "Final Solution"―from monuments to public school curricula―within the Jewish and German communities. He analyzes ethical issues concerning such concepts as intention, responsibility, forgiveness, and revenge, and puts forward a theory of the history of evil which provides a context for the Holocaust both historically and morally. Addressing the claims that the Nazi genocide was unique, Lang argues that the Holocaust is at once an actual series of events and a still future possibility. If the Holocaust occurred once, he argues, it can occur twice―and this view of the future remains an unavoidable premise for anyone now writing or thinking about that event in the past.

About this title

About the Author:

Berel Lang is Professor of Philosophy and Letters at Wesleyan University. He is the author of The Future of the Holocaust: Between History and Memory, also from Cornell, Holocaust-Representation: Art with the Bounds of History and Ethics, and Post-Holocaust: Interpretation, Misinterpretation, and the Claims of History. He is the editor of Race and Racism in Theory and Practice and coeditor of The Holocaust: A Reader.Berel Lang is Professor of Humanities at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. He has written ten books including Heidegger's Silence, also from Cornell, and is the editor of seven others.

Review:

"This outstanding collection of essays is distinguished by its almost uncanny good sense, its capacity to render wise, humane, and consistently persuasive judgments on nearly every crucial aspect of Holocaust studies."

(Steven J. Zipperstein, Koshland Professor in Jewish Culture and History, Stanford University)

"These brilliantly incisive and morally unrelenting essays challenge us to recognize the presence of the Holocaust in our contemporary culture and to continue the painful process of drawing lessons from it."

(Omer Bartov, Rutgers University)

"Lang... has compiled in this volume eleven thought-provoking essays... This is a useful, stimulating, and carefully researched anthology for both the general reader and the specialist in Holocaust studies."

(Leon Stein, Roosevelt University. Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Vol. 15, No. 2, Fall 2001)

About this edition

• Publisher: Cornell University Press
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0801435889
• ISBN 13: 9780801435881
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 224