Hans Gerhard Creutzfeldt (1885–1964) in the Third Reich

Neurology ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 95 (2) ◽  
pp. 72-76
Author(s):  
Michael Illert ◽  
Mathias Schmidt
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
University Hospital ◽  
Moral Integrity ◽  
Nazi Regime ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Forced Sterilization ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
German Navy ◽  
Nazi Euthanasia

Hans Gerhard Creutzfeldt (1885–1964) is an internationally known Professor of Psychiatry and Neurology. During the time of National Socialism (1933–1945), he worked in the Charite University Hospital Berlin and moved to Kiel University as Head of the Department for Psychiatry and Neurology in 1938. Until the turn of the millennium, Creutzfeldt was considered to be of moral integrity and an opponent of the Nazi regime and its eugenics measures. Publications of the last years came to the conclusion that this depiction does not hold up. They questioned his relations to the ideas and structures of the National Socialist system, his role as a consultant in the National Socialist's forced sterilization program, a possible involvement in the Nazi euthanasia measures, and his position as a psychiatric consultant for the German navy. The article considers 2 aspects concerning the National Socialist racial hygiene in greater detail by using newly found source material. It is shown that Creutzfeldt, although he did not actively resist, was not acting in the interest of the Nazi regime, but rather was trying to save as much patients as possible by changing their diagnoses and prevent them from being killed in the euthanasia program.

Hitler, for Example: Registers of National Socialist Exemplarity in Contemporary Germany

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-29
Author(s):  
Nitzan Shoshan
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Moral Values ◽  
Moral Life ◽  
Far Right ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Moral Exemplars ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Third Reich

Abstract This article examines whether and how the figure of Adolf Hitler in particular, and National Socialism more generally, operate as moral exemplars in today’s Germany. In conversation with similar studies about Mosely in England, Franco in Spain, and Mussolini in Italy, it seeks to advance our comparative understanding of neofascism in Europe and beyond. In Germany, legal and discursive constraints limit what can be said about the Third Reich period, while even far-right nationalists often condemn Hitler, for either the Holocaust or his military failure. Here I revise the concept of moral exemplarity as elaborated by Caroline Humphry to argue that Hitler and National Socialism do nevertheless work as contemporary exemplars, in at least three fashions: negativity, substitution, and extension. First, they stand as the most extreme markers of negative exemplarity for broad publics that understand them as illustrations of absolute moral depravity. Second, while Hitler himself is widely unpopular, Führer-substitutes such as Rudolf Hess provide alternative figures that German nationalists admire and seek to emulate. Finally, by extension to the realm of the ordinary, National Socialism introduces a cast of exemplars in the figures of loving grandfathers or anonymous fallen soldiers. The moral values for which they stand, I show, appear to be particularly significant for young nationalists. An extended, more open-ended notion of exemplarity, I conclude, can offer important insights about the lingering afterlife of fascist figures in the moral life of European nationalists today.

Ägyptologen im Dritten Reich: Biographische Notizen anhand der sogenannten „Steindorff-Liste“

2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 120-247 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Schneider
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Second World War ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
The Third ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
John Wilson ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Second World

Abstract The history of Egyptology in the Third Reich has never been the subject of academic analysis. This article gives a detailed overview of the biographies of Egyptologists in National Socialist Germany and their later careers after the Second World War. It scrutinizes their attitude towards the ideology of the Third Reich and their involvement in the political and intellectual Gleichschaltung of German Higher Education, as well as the impact National Socialism had on the discourse within the discipline. A letter written in 1946 by Georg Steindorff, one of the emigrated German Egyptologists, to John Wilson, Professor at the Oriental Institute Chicago, which incriminated former colleagues and exonerated others, is first published here and used as a framework for the debate.

scholarly journals Morality and Language of National Socialism

2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 80-99
Author(s):  
Andreas Buller ◽  
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Public Language ◽  
Anti Semitism ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Socialist Morality ◽  
A Minor ◽  
Relationship Of

This article presents an analysis of the diaries of the well-known German philologist of Jew­ish origin Victor Klemperer, who kept them in the Third Reich. From the perspective of these diaries, the author of the article examines the three central problems of the totalitarian language: the problem of its genesis and dissemination, the problem of the relationship of language with the ideology and morality of Nazi society, and, finally, the problem of per­sonal responsibility, especially the responsibility of public persons for the public language. Klemperer asks himself a question that we must ask ourselves as well: how can the language of a minor extremist (racist, religious, revolutionary) minority become the language of the majority? Furthermore, under what conditions does this linguistic change happen? Under what conditions does the totalitarian language emerge and spread? The danger of the totalitarian language is that it creates a seemingly legitimate basis to exclude a particular group or even specific groups from the society, thereby turning certain people into outsiders. The totalitarian language allows people to draw, mark and select. But behind this linguistic selection there is always a certain morality that implies concrete moral convictions and ethi­cal ideas. And so it was with the morality of National Socialism. The National Socialist morality was characterized by the spirit of racism and anti-Semitism, which manifested it­self primarily in the language of National Socialism. For this reason, we need to study the National Socialist language. But it also presupposes the study of National Socialist morality. This morality appears from time to time in the modern German language, esp. in the language of modern German extremists and racists. It poses a great danger to our soci­ety. In this respect, the study of the language of extremism can help us a lot, not only in or­der to recognize the close relationship between language and morality, but also possibly to avoid social catastrophes.

Tailoring Truth

2021 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-36
Author(s):  
Mikkel Dack
Keyword(s):  
Third Reich ◽  
Nazi Regime ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Family Stories ◽  
Self Reflection ◽  
The Third ◽  
Personal Histories ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Post War ◽  
Insight Into

As part of the post-war denazification campaign, as many as 20 million Germans were screened for employment by Allied armies. Applicants were ordered to fill out political questionnaires (Fragebögen) and allowed to justify their membership in Nazi organizations in appended statements. This mandatory act of self-reflection has led to the accumulation of a massive archival repository, likely the largest collection of autobiographical writings about the Third Reich. This article interprets individual and family stories recorded in denazification documents and provides insight into how Germans chose to remember and internalize the National Socialist years. The Fragebögen allowed and even encouraged millions of respondents to rewrite their personal histories and to construct whitewashed identities and accompanying narratives to secure employment. Germans embraced the unique opportunity to cast themselves as resisters and victims of the Nazi regime. These identities remained with them after the dissolution of the denazification project and were carried forward into the post-occupation period.

German Schoolteachers, National Socialism, and the Politics of Culture at the End of the Weimar Republic

2001 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 53-82
Author(s):  
Marjorie Lamberti
Keyword(s):  
Weimar Republic ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
Democratic Republic ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Teaching Profession ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
School Teaching ◽  
Political Forces ◽  
National Congress ◽  
The Third Reich

In the Third Reich a high percentage of the civil servants in the cadres of functionaries of the National Socialist Party on the local and district levels were teachers. It is thus not surprising that some historians who studied the elementary school teaching profession in the Weimar Republic began their research with assumptions about the “ideological affinities” of teachers to fascism and discussed “the specific predispositions that made it easy for them to identify with National Socialism.” The German Teachers' Association, one scholar wrote, “proved to be more a precursor than an opponent of fascism.” At its national congress in May 1932, another historian related, the representatives of the chapters voted for a policy which, in effect, abandoned the democratic republic and “indirectly helped those political forces that would create a dictatorship in Germany within a year.” In 1932 and 1933, on the other hand, recruiters for the National Socialist Teachers’ League often complained about “hard and difficult soil” and “unpenetrable” regions.

Secret suffering: the victims of compulsory sterilization during National Socialism

2012 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 483-487
Author(s):  
Stefanie Westermann
Keyword(s):  
19Th Century ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Human Reproduction ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
The Third ◽  
Compulsory Sterilization ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Genetically Determined ◽  
The 19Th Century

From the second half of the 19th century, eugenics claimed the medical and social need to intervene in human reproduction. During National Socialism, 300,000–400,000 people in Germany were subjected to compulsory sterilization because they had psychological diseases, impairments and social behavioural problems, which were regarded as genetically determined. After the end of the Third Reich, these interventions were not recognized as National Socialist injustice, and the victims were initially excluded from ‘compensation’. As shown in letters and interviews, the victims of compulsory sterilization suffered physically and psychologically throughout their lives. In particular, feelings of social ‘inferiority’, and of shame and suffering from compulsory childlessness and broken relationships, are found in many of the sources examined.

scholarly journals THE AMBIVALENCE OF MODERNISM FROM THE WEIMAR REPUBLIC TO NATIONAL SOCIALISM AND RED VIENNA

2009 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 223-234
Author(s):  
SIEGFRIED MATTL
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Artistic Style ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Critical Studies ◽  
The Third ◽  
Art Policy ◽  
Jazz Music ◽  
The Third Reich

Focusing on the spectacular propaganda exhibitions “Degenerate Art” and “Degenerate Music,” critical studies of Nazism's art policy long considered the regime's public attack on modernism and the turn to pseudo-classicism as decisive proof of Nazism's reactionary character. Studies such as Die Kunst im Dritten Reich (1974), which inspired broader research on the topic in the early 1970s, subscribed to a modern conception of aesthetics in which art expresses complex systems of ideas in progress. Artistic style, from this perspective, corresponded to political tendencies and reflected the traditional divide between conservatism and progressivism. But those boundaries have become blurred in the wake of more recent research, which has demonstrated the involvement of modernist artists in Nazi art (e.g. members of the Bauhaus involved in National Socialist architecture or avant-garde filmmakers such as Walter Ruttmann in National Socialist propaganda films) and, conversely, the continual performance of popular jazz music in the Third Reich (e.g. in radio programmes). Seen against such instances of modernist collaboration and its own occasional mimicry of modernism, National Socialism acquires a more ambivalent profile, characterized by the ongoing conflict between reactionary factions and those who favoured modernization for various reasons.

scholarly journals An Analysis of Physician Behaviors During the Holocaust: Modern Day Relevances

Conatus ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 265
Author(s):  
Susan Maria Miller ◽  
Stacy Gallin
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
Medical Profession ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Special Role ◽  
Physician Patient Relationship ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Collective Behaviors ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Third Reich

Even with the passage of time, the misguided motivations of highly educated, physician-participants in the genocide known as the Holocaust remain inexplicable and opaque. Typically, the physician-patient relationship inherent within the practice of medicine, has been rooted in the partnership between individuals. However, under the Third Reich, this covenant between a physician and patient was displaced by a public health agenda that was grounded in the scientific theory of eugenics and which served the needs of a polarized political system that relied on this hypothesis to justify society’s racial hygiene laws. As part of the National Socialist propaganda, Adolf Hitler ominously argued that the cultural decline of Germany after World War I could largely be based on interbreeding and a “resultant drop in the racial level.” This foundational premise defined those who could be ostracized, labeled and persecuted by society, including those who were assimilated. The indoctrination and implementation of this distorted social policy required the early and sustained cooperation and leadership of the medical profession. Because National Socialism promised it could restore Germany’s power, honor and dignity, physicians embraced their special role in the repair of the state. This article will explore the imperative role, moral risks and deliberate actions of physicians who participated in the amplification process from “euthanasia” to systemic murder to medically-sanctioned genocide. A goal of this analysis will be to explore what perils today’s physicians would face if they were to experience the transitional and collective behaviors of a corrupted medical profession, or if they would, instead, have the fortitude and courage necessary to protect themselves against this collaboration. Our premise is that an awareness of history can serve as a safeguard to the conceit of political ascendency and discrimination.

National Socialism and Consumption

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Jonathan Wiesen
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
The United States ◽  
Consumer Society ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Benito Mussolini ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
The Third Reich

Many important works in the field of consumer studies focus on the United States and post-World War II Western Europe, with the former often cast as the paradigmatic example of consumer society. Notwithstanding the disruptions of the Great Depression and less-severe business cycles, these societies offer plentiful images of bustling stores, widening economic opportunities, and the emergence of politicized citizen-consumers. The unique violence of the movements – whether manifested in the militant machismo of Benito Mussolini or the genocidal thrust of National Socialism – sets fascism apart from other twentieth-century developments. This article addresses some of the questions that emerge from a consideration of fascism and consumption, focusing in particular on National Socialist Germany, where consumption served a uniquely harsh end. It explores how Nazism envisioned the function of buying, selling, and consuming; the extent to which consumption was shaped by the state's ideological priorities; Nazi visions of consumption; realities of consumption and marketing in the Third Reich; and the debate on consumption and consent.

scholarly journals Selfhood, Place, and Ideology in German Photo Albums, 1933–1945

2015 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 335-365 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maiken Umbach
Keyword(s):  
Collective Identity ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Affective States ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
Photo Album ◽  
Archival Record ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
The One ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractThis article explores the significance of photography and photo-album making as practices that many Germans used to record their lives during the Third Reich. Millions of photos not only offer insights into everyday life under National Socialism: mass photography itself had a transformative effect, turning seemingly mundane actions into performances for the camera and into conscious acts of self-representation. The article also considers the relationship between amateur snapshots, on the one hand, and propagandistic and commercial photographs, on the other. Identifying connections between the genres, it argues that these are best understood as two-way processes of borrowing and (re-)appropriation, in which private subjectivity and public ideology constantly commingled. Particularly important in linking the two were photos of emotional or affective states, such as relaxation, exploration, introspection, and even melancholy, which were often defined or underscored by the ways in which both civilians and soldiers positioned themselves in relation to particular landscapes. The photographic archival record is highly varied, but such variation notwithstanding, photos helped cement immersive “experience” as the basis for individual and collective identity; this was central to the ideology of the National Socialist regime, even if it never wholly controlled its meanings.

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