Germany

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Holocaust History

This specialized “Holocaust” tour of Berlin explores responses to the Holocaust as reflected in the arts of its victims and survivors and its continued impact on society in Germany today. Guided site visits, professional lectures, and public talks by Holocaust survivors will deepen your knowledge and strengthen current teaching practices.

Our 7-day program explores the monuments and memorials honoring the lives (lived and lost) of Jews during the Nazi regime in Germany. We start by visiting two major sites commemorating, in abstract and controversial ways, the physical and spiritual meaning of the Holocaust:

The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe consists of 2,711 concrete stelae arranged in a grid pattern creating long, straight and narrow alleys. The memorial is fully immersive so that visitors can walk through the alleys and experience the uneasy atmosphere of the layout. The underground Visitor Information Centre remembers Jewish Holocaust victims, sharing the names and histories of individuals and families.

The Jewish Museum Berlin is the largest Jewish museum in Europe documenting Jewish-German history. We’ll visit the Libeskind building with its installation of Shalekhet – Fallen leaves: 10,000 faces punched out of steel and laid on the ground in the Memory Void, as well as the Garden of Exile, an outdoor memorial consisting of 49 concrete rectangular columns over 6 ft tall, intended to represent the exile of Jews.

Other memorial sites to be visited include:

• Jewish Victims of Fascism – sculpture installation of 13 figures outside the former Jewish cemetery in Berlin Mitte.
• Weiseensee Jewish Cemetery – the largest Jewish cemetery in Europe with 115,000 graves.
• Platform 17 Memorial – 186 steel plates give the date, destination, and number of Jews deported from Grunewald Station.
• The Stumbling Stones – 7,000 brass plates which mark the homes and offices of deported Jews.
• Silent Heroes Memorial Centre – exhibition honoring those who helped Jews during the Nazi regime.
• Trains to Life – Trains to Death Memorial – sculptural group of children outside Friedrichstraße station commemorating both the children deported to concentration camps and the children transferred to Eastern Europe by the Kindertransporte.

In addition to site visits, participants will hear several guest lectures hosted by the Institute of Jewish Studies at the Freie Universität Berlin as well as public talks by Holocaust survivors.

For a DAILY ITINERARY, please contact our office.