Evil

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Eaglestone
Keyword(s):  
Nobel Laureate ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Working Through ◽  
William Golding ◽  
Second World ◽  
Do So

Evil—the Nobel laureate William Golding wrote that anyone who lived through the years of the Second World War ‘without understanding that man produces evil as a bee produces honey, must have been blind or wrong in the head’. Why, then, do accounts by Holocaust perpetrators and fictions that focus on perpetrators and which appear to teach us about evil fail to do so, swerve from the issue, and seem shallow and unproductive? By working through Hannah Arendt’s changing view of evil, this chapter develops a way to answer this question and examine the significance of evil, first in relation to texts by perpetrators (often, like Speer with Sereny, by or with proxies) then in relation to fiction about perpetrators, concluding with the most significant work of Holocaust fiction in recent years, Jonathan Littell’s The Kindly Ones.

Evolution in the Theatre of Gabriel Cousin

1976 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 205-215
Author(s):  
D. W. Jeffery
Keyword(s):  
Second World War ◽  
Creative Activity ◽  
World War ◽  
The Past ◽  
Second World ◽  
Do So

To anyone familiar with the work of Gabriel Cousin, adaptability is a natural and acceptable phenomenon that has been, and still remains, a feature of his writing for the theatre. As an evolving and creative activity, his dramatic output has expressed his ‘prise de conscience’ on social and political themes for the past thirty years. Since the end of the Second World War when, with the group known as Les Compagnons de la Saint-Jean, Cousin's rôle was to put to paper the collective product of their ideas, he has continued to work on a collaborative basis with producers, musicians, designers and theatre managements. Indeed, the willingness to do so frequently becomes a necessity in view of some of the difficult problems that a production of his plays entail – problems that affect the audience as much as the actors and producers.

The State and the Jews: Reflections on Difficult Freedom

2006 ◽  
Vol 14 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 109-130
Author(s):  
Annette Aronowicz
Keyword(s):  
Jewish People ◽  
Second World War ◽  
The State ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Political ◽  
Modern State ◽  
World War ◽  
Political Dimension ◽  
Second World ◽  
Do So

AbstractThis essay examines the contrast between two conceptions of the universal, one represented by the modern State and the other by the Jewish people. In order to do so, it returns to the collection of essays on Judaism Levinas wrote in the approximately two decades after the Second World War, Difficult Freedom. Its aim is to focus specifically on the political dimension within this collection and then to step back and reflect on how his way of speaking of the political appears to us a full generation later. As is well known, Levinas's approach to the political has a way of escaping that realm, while nonetheless remaining relevant to it. This is what we shall try to capture and to evaluate.

Religion and Social Control in the Soviet Union 1945–1964

1984 ◽  
Vol 21 ◽  
pp. 473-480
Author(s):  
Gavin White
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Social Control ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
The West ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Second World ◽  
Do So

Why have churches in the U.S.S.R. been harassed in recent years? It has been supposed by many that if Stalin stopped most persecution during the Second World War, then things under Khrushchev could only improve. Instead they deteriorated, and all liberties of Soviet citizens received more respect except the religious.A common answer has been that the Soviet authorities were horrified by the continued hold of religion which they considered to be a threat to Marxism. Such a view is quite popular in the west where a clash of ideologies, with Christianity triumphing over Marxism, consoles churchmen who cannot find such a triumph in their own society. But this assumes that the Soviet rulers consider Christianity to be a religion based on certain tenets, and as Marxists they cannot be expected to do so. For them religion is primarily an instrument of social control.

scholarly journals A 2x2=4 hobbyhorse: Mark Blaug on rational and historical reconstructions

2014 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 64 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harro Maas
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
Historical Reconstruction ◽  
World War ◽  
History Of Economics ◽  
History Of ◽  
Magnum Opus ◽  
Second World ◽  
Do So

Over time, Mark Blaug became increasingly sceptical of the merits of the approach to the history of economics that we find in his magnum opus, Economic theory in retrospect, first published in 1962, and increasingly leaned to favour 'historical' over 'rational' reconstructions. In this essay, I discuss Blaug's shifting historiographical position, and the changing terms of historiographical debate. I do so against the background of Blaug's personal life history and the increasingly beleaguered position the history of economic thought found itself in after the Second World War. I argue that Blaug never resolved the tensions between historical and rational reconstructions, partly because he never fleshed out a viable notion of historical reconstruction. I trace Blaug's difficulty in doing so to his firm conviction that the history of economics should speak to economists, a conviction clearly present in his 2001 essay: "No history of ideas, please, we're economists".

The Long Shadow of the Perpetrators

2020 ◽  
Vol 53 (2) ◽  
pp. 77-86
Author(s):  
Alexandra Senfft
Keyword(s):  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Working Through ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
Psychological Difficulties ◽  
Second World

This article addresses the transgenerational consequences of the Second World War and the Holocaust for the descendants of the Nazi perpetrators and bystanders. Using the example of her own family, the author traces the external obstacles and the psychological difficulties arising from working through a legacy of crime, compounded by the fact that an atmosphere of taboos, silence and denial has persisted within German families – in spite of all the research and enlightenment in the academic and political spheres. The author argues that the patterns of feeling, thinking and action are often passed down when they are not scrutinised. Meaningful dialogues with the survivors and their descendants, as well as authentic remembrance, the author claims, can only take place if descendants of the victimisers break away from those generationally transmitted narratives which continue to evade the entire truth about the crimes committed by the Nazis and their accomplices in Europe.

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wendy Webster
Keyword(s):  
British Empire ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Gallup Poll ◽  
Government Decision ◽  
Post War ◽  
Second World ◽  
Do So

In 2015, a display opened at Imperial War Museum North, telling the story of people who arrived in Britain during the Second World War—chiefly from continental Europe, America and the British Empire—and of what happened to them when the war was over.1 A museum visitor commented, ‘People post-war wanted Polish fighters to leave despite the help we were given—sad reflection of “Brexit Britain” ’. The comment was prompted by a panel in the display on Polish soldiers and airmen. Many were in Britain during the Second World War and lost their lives fighting alongside British forces. But when a Gallup Poll was held in Britain in June 1946, asking people whether they agreed with a government decision to allow Poles who wanted to remain in Britain to do so, more than half answered ‘no’....

scholarly journals INTEGRATED GEOMATIC TECHNIQUES FOR THE LOCALIZATION AND GEOREFERENCING OF ANCIENT HERMITAGES

2021 ◽  
Vol XLVI-M-1-2021 ◽  
pp. 31-37
Author(s):  
V. Baiocchi ◽  
M. Onori ◽  
M. Scuti
Keyword(s):  
Structure From Motion ◽  
Accuracy Assessment ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Second World War ◽  
The Other ◽  
Geographical Information ◽  
World War ◽  
Survey Techniques ◽  
Second World ◽  
Do So

Abstract. Historical maps represent an important source of geographical information. The changes occurred over time can be extrapolated from them, especially if their geometric accuracies match those achievable with modern survey techniques. An 1820 map belonging to the Gregorian Cadastre provides the position of seven hermitages belonging to the monastery of Fara in Sabina (Italy). Just three of them are nowadays visible, while the others may have been covered by thick vegetation or been destroyed during the Second World War. The paper proposes the integration of geomatic techniques for the localization of the lost hermitages. To do so, Structure from Motion (SfM) algorithms were applied to UAV imagery to produce an orthophoto of the area. In addition, a GNSS survey was carried out using a professional and a low-cost receiver to correctly georeference the photogrammetric products. An accuracy assessment was then performed to evaluate the performance of the u-blox board in real applications. The accuracies obtained with the low-cost receiver indicates a possible more widespread utilization of these new devices. Subsequently, the comparison between the orthophoto and the cadastral map have been detailed. A weak correspondence between the position of the hermitages in the two maps have been observed. On the other side, the comparison led to the localization of two lost hermitages, with the other two being still undiscovered. This study has opened the door to an enhancement process of the monastery and to the rediscovery of the religious values of the hermitages.

The Colditz Syndrome: The Need to Escape from Group Therapy

2001 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 273-286 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bill Thorndycraft
Keyword(s):  
Group Therapy ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Psychological Pain ◽  
Internal Conflicts ◽  
The Moment ◽  
Second World ◽  
Do So

Patients who seek psychotherapy do so with the desire to be assisted in their endeavour to escape and be free of their internal conflicts, psychological pain and the distress which impairs and disturbs their ability to be at peace with themselves and others. Patients who choose group therapy will encounter certain dynamics in the group from the moment of joining, which will provoke the desire to escape from the group and its containing boundaries. The author suggests that, in order to escape successfully from the group - and essentially the neurosis which the patient brings to the group - there is a need to integrate the good enabling/holding aspects of the group with the perceived restrictive/punitive elements. The article uses the met aphor of the group as a castle and makes a comparison with Colditz Castle during the Second World War

(A)symmetry of (Non-)memory

2016 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 766-784 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mateusz Magierowski
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Local Community ◽  
Institutional Support ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Working Through ◽  
The Village ◽  
Second World ◽  
Depth Interviews ◽  
Local Leaders

During the Second World War, the village of Pawłokoma, nowadays located a dozen kilometres from the Polish–Ukrainian border, was an area of conflict between the two nations. It has been almost ten years since a ceremony was held commemorating the victims of the conflict. The ceremony was attended by the Polish and Ukrainian Presidents. Today, the village is a symbol of reconciliation between the two nations. This article analyzes the dynamics of local collective memory about the conflict, using the “working through” concept and works on social remembering as a theoretical framework. In my discussion of the causes and effects of the changes in dynamics, I use data from individual in-depth interviews with three categories of respondents: the inhabitants of Pawłokoma, local leaders, and experts. The aforementioned ceremony was an opportunity for working through the traumatic past in the local community of Pawłokoma. Although social consultations were held in Pawłokoma rather than a comprehensive working-through process, we should be talking about a symbolic substitute for this process. Despite the fact that material commemorations of the Polish and Ukrainian victims were erected, some factors essential to accomplishing the working-through process were missed, such as complex institutional support, the engagement of younger generations, and empathy towards the “Others” and their sufferings.

Communities of Feeling: Fear, Death, and Grief in the Writing of British Servicemen in the Second World War

Total War ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 116-136
Author(s):  
Lucy Noakes
Keyword(s):  
Military Service ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Hybrid Identities ◽  
Military Community ◽  
Multiple Challenges ◽  
Expression Of Emotions ◽  
The Military ◽  
Second World ◽  
Do So

The Second World War saw the conscription and mobilisation of around 5.8 million British men for military service. Very few had any prior military experience or training. This chapter looks at some of the letters, diaries, and memoirs written by men serving in the Army to consider how they tried to construct a new, militarised sense of identity, and the emotional styles that they used to communicate this. Letters, diaries, and memoirs provided a resource for both the expression of emotions that could not be articulated in the military community, and for the process of fashioning a new militarised selfhood. Drawing on work undertaken by historians working on the construction of selfhood, the chapter examines a range of these documents to consider the ways that men constructed and articulated this new militarised identity, and the emotional styles that they utilised to do so. However, war provided multiple challenges to these new, hybrid, identities, none more so than the threat of death, or the death of friends and comrades. The chapter concludes by considering the emotional styles that some men used to record their encounters with death, and the ways that these encounters could destabilise their new, militarised, selfhoods.

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