Ashkenazi Jews

“By the Waters of Babylon” Paper In the short story, “By the Waters of Babylon” by Stephen Vincent Benet, the setting is post-apocalyptic and is about what Benet thought the world would be after the events of WWII. In this story the world was destroyed and people forgot the important knowledge that was known at that time. The simple knowledge they know now is how to hunt, and that there is a place where the gods live. But when the main character, John, goes to the Place of the Gods, which was…

Book report: Eric D Weitz a Century of Genocide: Utopias of Race and Nation Eric D Weitz’s a Century of Genocide: Utopias of Race and Nation focuses on four key genocides – the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, Cambodia and the Bosnian war. The topics discussed are very popular, particularly Nazi-Germany and Stalinist Russia, which is worth noting as someone well-read in the topic may not gain any further knowledge from this. A Dean at the City College of New York, who has previously written books on…

individuals it affects are Holocaust survivors. In The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, Liesel Meminger survives the consequences of WWII. Although she was not a Jew who went to concentration camps, she still experiences trauma that would leave someone scarred for life. What she experiences during the holocaust was the death of her brother and hiding a Jew. Before Meminger knew it, she turns out to be the sole survivor on Himmel Street. Liesel Meminger begins her journey on a train to Molching…

Physically Free, Emotionally Bound Connor Alforque explores David Fengel’s inspiring story from extreme depravity and captivity to his freedom journey home. Will David’s long and agonising ordeal inside a concentration camp deprive him of finally experiencing true freedom, or can he radically rebuild his mind after the experiences he endured during his excruciating past? Held captive and abandoned, David’s mind was in darkness, his eyes were blind to the outside world and David was…

Living the life I live today, I could not imagine having to live off of goat milk, eggs, UN rations, or whatever I could grow along with getting brutal beatings in and outside of school. In Of Beetles and Angles by Mawi Asgedom, it tells the story of Mawi and the difficulties, hardships, and experiences that he faces in the refugee camp in Umsagata, Sudan in the early 1980's. In differeation to my life, Mawi had to experience a lot of difficulty in the camp; there were brutal beatings in and out…

The rise of existentialism coincided with the end of World War II, and for good reason. Such loss and devastation faced by all the nations involved led the masses to take a deeper look at their philosophies and, more specifically, where to find the so-called “meaning of life” after the world had proven its inability to decipher right and wrong. The nations wondered how such a travesty could come about and began to think that everything they knew and relied upon was wrong. Many came this…

people lose their homelands and none is better known than that of the Jewish Holocaust during World War II. In particular, this is true for the case of the Bulgarian Jews during World War II since they felt the need to both abandon their home in Bulgaria but at the same time found refuge there. The fight for homeland for the Bulgarian Jews displays the themes seen in “Home” such as betrayal from friends, loss of identity in a homeland, illegal…

Discussion Questions 1. In Kluger’s view, should we preserve and visit places such as Auschwitz? What arguments speak for and against it? What is your opinion? In Kluger’s view, we should not necessarily preserve and visit places such as Auschwitz. The author explains her views while talking to graduate students. The students claimed that, “Preservation was a form of restitution” (p. 64). Although they agreed that no one liked the touristy action of people gawking at Auschwitz, they stated…

Summary and Reaction to ‘There’s More to Life Than Being Happy’ Emily Esfahani Smith’s article ‘There’s More to Life Than Being Happy’ (The Atlantic: June 2013) discusses the ideas in a book written by Viktor Frankl, a prominent Jewish psychiatrist and neurologist who was a survivor of a Nazi concentration camp. In his book, Man’s Search for Meaning, Frankl concludes that camp prisoners who had found meaning in their life were more satisfied and therefore more likely to survive. Those that had…

Chapter 1 Summary: Their in a small town and people were taken by soldiers Key quotation: “It belonged to everyone since it no longer belonged to anyone” Questions/Reflections: What is a Yellow Star? Why were Jews told to wear them? Why did the storyteller and his family get to stay and everyone else was taken? Chapter 2 Summary: The story teller and his family were taken into a train with the rest of the people and were brought to the first camp that they stay at. Key quotation:…