The Anonymous Diary of a Female Journalist during the Occupation Period of Soviet Russia in Berlin

By reading The Girls of Atomic City the reader can gain knowledge on the women’s history in the war. People who want to learn more about the women in history might find this book useful. Denise Kiernan captures their spirits, commitment, and dedication of the factory workers, secretaries and chemist. She shows everything that went on behind the scenes of World War II, while the men were off fighting. The woman had no idea what they were doing, all they knew is that they were helping win the war quicker. Kiernan did an excellent job portraying the women’s thoughts and attitudes towards their jobs. They stepped up and did what needed to be done in order to win World War II. The Girls of Atomic City is a good example of how women can actually leave a huge impact on the world. Denise Kiernan helped the reader learn about their stories, events leading up to World War II, and what they did to help end the war

Personally, this was the hardest section of the book to get through. The majority of content from this section described events that were leading up to Stalingrad. There were stories on how the higher ups of the German and Soviet governments responded to

Erika Riemann was a teenager living in East Germany at the end of World War II. Her oral testimony describes her experiences as a political prisoner during the cold war. She was arrested in 1945 for drawing a bow on a portrait of Stalin that hung in her school classroom. At the time of her arrest she was only 14 years old.

Vladek is depicted as a hero who shows countless acts of selflessness and generosity and a villain who is, “opinionated, tight-fisted, and self-involved”. (Brown 6) Art Spiegelman’s book Maus, tells the story of how Vladek and Anja Spiegelman survived the Holocaust. Spiegelman illustrates Vladek as a man who single-handily saved his family from starvation and Auschwitz in World War I. During Spiegelman’s interviews, we get an idea of Vladek’s darker side since the war ended. Mala to speak of her astonishment and disgust in Vladek’s character. Which leaves us to question how truthfully these stories are being told. In the end, Vladek’s unsuccessful heroism is a constant reminder of his failure; survival with Anja was always easier, after her death, Vladek pushes everyone away with his “guilt and manipulation” (Brown 7)

The book written by Christopher R. Browning titled Ordinary Men is an interesting, engaging, anomaly in the genre of non-fiction books pertaining to the topic of World War Two and the Holocaust. Browning’s analysis of what possessed ordinary German men, who’s ideas where non pertinent in relation to Nazism is one worthy of academic study and discourse. Browning is delving into the intricacies of what specifically pushed “ordinary” men in the Reserve Police Battalions 101 of Nazi Germany to perpetrate the action of moving thousands of Polish Jewry into box cars, and sequentially taking part in perhaps the worst enormity in human history. Browning’s argument is an ever unsettling one, an argument that reveals to the reader what “normal” people

Limitations exist amongst her interpretation of East Germany narrowing the audience that Funder attempts to permeate with obscure knowledge stored in the minds of endless victims. The subjective thoughts presented put a taint on the knowledge received, one can only consider her truth with a level of exactness if they too were raised in similar conditions as Funder. Therefore it provides the ability to compare the lifestyle you consider worthy of human activity with the occurrences in East Germany, whilst allowing perspective to be manipulated by experience in the environment Funder observes. The inclusion of judgements and conclusions provides us to interpret the situation further, due to her acknowledgement that we should not necessarily believe her – “You know they want to stop thinking about the past. They want to pretend it all didn’t happen”. Funder’s lack of experience prior to her journey makes her understanding of the past narrow. She is intent on the idea that revealing and using your past to create a future is necessary. The GDR controls the associated people to this day, without an appropriate explanation of the happenings it has left them with the inability to piece together the numerous aspects embedded in their thoughts. The missing parts dominate these

The Reading A Woman in Berlin details the experiences of a women during the time when Russia occupied Berlin, Germany. While reading about her experience we are able to understand many things about Russia occupation in Berlin, Germany. Her diary expresses the problems women faced in regards to the Russian soldiers, the affect the war played on the Germans in Berlin, and how the German people dealt with the Russia soldiers.

The Holocaust, yet another unpleasant time in history tainted with the blood and suffering of man. Human beings tortured, executed and starved for hatred and radical ideas. Yet with many tragedies there are survivors, those who refused to die on another man’s command. These victims showed enormous willpower, they overcame human degradation and tragedies that not only pushed their beliefs in god, but their trust in fellow people. It was people like Elie Wiesel author of “Night”, Eva Galler,Sima Gleichgevicht-Wasser, and Solomon Radasky that survived, whose’ mental and physical capabilities were pushed to limits that are difficult to conceive. Each individual experiences were different, but their survival tales not so far-reaching to where the fundamental themes of fear, family, religion and self-preservation played a part in surviving. Although some of these themes weren’t always so useful for survival.

In the book Frauen: German Women Recall the Third Reich by Alison Owings, we are provided with plenty of women who describe their lives before, during and after Hitler received power. This book provides us with different views of the time era and as well as how the impact of Hitler affected every woman differently through social class, age, marital status and etc. This paper will explore the lives of three German women who seem to be in the Grey area during the over control of Hitler but mostly with the killings of the Jews. This paper will further explore the complicity and the different levels of resistance that these three women had during this time era which is 1933-1945. The three women that will be discussed in this paper are Margarete (Margrit) Fischer, Ellen Frey, and Christine (Tini) Weihs. When looking into the lives of all three women these women it seems as though women didn’t have much of a responsibility for the events that were happening around them. Although these women seemed to be complaint to a certain degree with the events there were going on around them. These women would have been complaint due to the fear of what happened to Germans when they stood against the events that took part.

Between Dignity and Despair, a book written by Marion A. Kaplan, published in 1998, gives us a portrait of Jewish life in Nazi Germany by the astounding memoirs, diaries, interviews with survivors, and letters of Jewish women and men. The book is written in chronological order of events, from the daily life of German Jewish families prior to when the Holocaust began to the days when rights were completely taken away; from the beginning of forced labor and exile to the repercussion of the war. Kaplan tries to include details from each significant event during the time of the Holocaust. Kaplan

The most obvious and elementary instance in which gender analysis is relevant to the topic of Jewish deportation during the Holocaust is when gender is referenced explicitly. For example, the scene in Schindler’s List where female and male Jews are told to group on opposite sides of the street in preparation for transport to the Płaszów concentration camp is a clear invocation of gender to frame a depiction of deportation. However, in order for gender analysis to be constructive, it is necessary to also discuss the underlying power relations that gender subtly affects. Joan Scott addresses this concept directly when she asserts that ‘the implementation of Nazi policy in Germany’ was an example of power that was justified as ‘masculine’. Furthermore, Scott emphasises that oppressive actions against women by the state, such as the Holocaust, can ‘only be made sense of as part of an analysis of the construction and consolidation of power’. Using this broad framework of characterising gender as an essential element of power and politics, we can apply Scott’s theoretical structure to the Holocaust and glean insight that would otherwise be impossible to achieve under

Each of these histories reveal a story of suffering that is endured by both Gentile and Jew, but also a story of humanity and salvation. In Five Chimneys: A woman Survivor’s True Story of Auschwitz, Olga Lengyel tells of her family assisting other Jews fleeing the Nazi military. Later, after her own ordeals in Auschwitz, she was saved by citizens in a small Polish village. An essay written by Vera Laska is included in Women and the Holocaust: Different Voices, which is an anthology of essays about women in the Holocaust. In addition to the many stories of survivors and rescuers, I am using several scholarly articles

Although men served in battle in World War I, women also had important roles that sometimes were not as praised as men’s. Certain situations in All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich M. Remarque can be seen as unsupportive of feminism, or the belief of equality of the sexes. Historically, women typically served as the hospital orderlies to care for and heal wounded soldiers in war. Surprisingly, mostly men play the role of the orderlies in All Quiet on the Western Front are men rather than women to do important jobs such as grabbing “[the bodies] as soon as [they] are dead”(Remarque 16). With the men attaining the role of orderlies as opposed to the women, the story is not necessarily in support of the feminist idea of equality between the

Sohn, Anne-Marie. "Between the Wars in France and England." A History of Women in the West, Volume V Toward a Cultural Identity in the Twentieth Century (History of Women in the West). By Georges Duby. Vol. 5. New York: Belkn

The Holocaust is a very large topic with many subtopics within, which many people have never heard of. One in particular is the Hidden Children of the Holocaust. Like a majority of individuals, I never heard of this topic before, until I started my inquiry work. Hiding children during the holocaust was an effort to save thousands of children’s lives. The children were hidden in different ways, either with false identities, underground, and with or without their parents. The children with false identities were allowed to participate in everyday life activities, like attend school and socialize with children their age, which in the long run this lead to less emotional and mental issues. However, the children that were hidden and not allowed to leave their hiding spots often faced boredom, pain, and torment. Some children were capable of being hid with their parents while other children were not. Depending on the situation the child was in, depends on the effects it had on the child during this time. In this paper, I will be discussing works by two scholars, Natalia Aleksiun’s Gender and Daily Lives of Jews in Hiding in Eastern Galicia and Judy Mitchell’s Children of the Holocaust. Aleksiun’s article talks about the daily lives of Jews in hiding and also about how they prepared their hideouts. Aleksiun’s article mainly focuses on children that were hidden with their families. In Mitchell’s article, he focuses on the hidden children and gives examples/survivor stories on what it