Visually Working Through the German Past by Generations: "Holocaust" and "War of Extermination, Crimes of the Wehrmacht 1941-1944"

Indianapolis, IN

Many German and American researchers have studied the truly long-lasting effects of World War II on German society, especially the direct effect on the generation that lived and acted during the war and the indirect effect on the later generations whose ancestors lived and acted during the war. Based on Dan Bar-On's "double wall phenomenon," the different generations handle their feelings, understanding, and acceptance of guilt by building emotional walls around the topic of World War II and the Holocaust. I argue that two cultural visual mediums, one local and one international, significantly aided in opening up the familial and societal discourse on the 'taboo' subject of Nazi war crimes and broke down the "double wall." The 1978 American miniseries Holocaust and the 1995 photography exhibit "War of Extermination, Crimes of the Wehrmacht 1941-1944" allowed the younger German generations an exposure to their nation's culpability beyond their education and discussions within the family and also focused on the culpability of the common German, not just that of the Nazi soldiers and officials. These cultural mediums allow Germans an opportunity to visually work through their past, first within generations of families and then to a further extent within generations of German society as a whole.