CGES Spring 2008 eventsCGES Fall 2008 events |
Spring 2008
Conference on Tuesday, March 18:
'Forget 68 - it was wonderful, but it's over!'
Revisiting the 1960s in Germany, Europe, and the US
This event is co-sponsored by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) and the Max Kade Foundation, and is organized in collaboration with the Institute for Human Sciences at Boston University and the Goethe Institut Boston.
Daniel Cohn-Bendit is a publicist and politician who became famous in the Sixties 
as 
'Dany The Red'. He grew up in Germany and France and became a spokesperson and leader of the May-Revolution in Paris. After the May riots, Cohn-Bendit was expelled from France and lived in Frankfurt, where, together with Joschka Fischer, he was a member of the Frankfurt Sponti-scene which was exercising the social revolution by means of squatting, street fighting, and agitation in companies such as Hoechst and Opel. He co-founded the alternative city-magazine Pflasterstrand. During the 1980s, Cohn-Bendit joined the newly founded Green Party in Germany, and since January 2002, he is co-president of the Greens/Free European Alliance Group in the European Parliament. Related links Daniel Cohn-Bendit
With our symposium, CGES hopes to demystify the 1960s and to help assess the successes and failures of the revolutionary movements on both sides of the Atlantic.In Germany, the sixties are generally assumed to have had three major consequences: A dramatic change in the way the country dealt with its past, a profound change in family dynamics, and a complete overhaul of the educational system. At present, at least two of these consequences are experiencing some form of backlash, as Germany struggles with a decreasing birthrate and a poor international reputation of its schools. The sixties also heralded the beginning of a very positive identification of Europe with America, as well as new forms of anti-Americanism.
1968 marked the pinnacle of a number of political movements in Europe and the United States. This included the opposition from outside of the German parliament (Außerparlamentarische Opposition, or APO), which was primarily represented by the socialist German student union (Sozialistischer Deutscher Studentenbund). The sixties in Germany were marked by confrontation, from the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961, to the killing of a student, Benno Ohnesorg, by police at a demonstration against the visit of Shah Reza Parlevi to Berlin in June of 1967.Parallel to the Black Power movement that grew in the wake of the assassination of Martin Luther King, and the Free Speech Movement by American students in California, young Germans were confronted by the Eichmann Trial in Jerusalem (1961) and the Frankfurt Auschwitz Trials (1963-65). The silence of the older generations about the Nazi era led to a wave of investigations into the complicity of all branches of German society (including the universities, the media, and the legal system).
The dramatic events in Paris (May, 1968), Zurich (June, 1968), and Prague (August, 1968) led to major disillusionment among many of the protesters in Germany. The assassination attempt that left student leader Rudi Dutschke seriously injured paralyzed the movement, and eventually led the most radical participants to form the left-wing terrorist organization RAF (Red Army Fraction) in 1970.
Panel Speakers:
George Ross, Brandeis University
Laura Miller, Brandeis Univesity
David Cunningham, Brandeis University
Timothy Brown, Northeastern University
and Brandeis University students
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
from 2:30 pm to 5:00 pm:
Rapaporte Treasure Hall, Goldfarb Library
Refreshments will be served
The event is open to the public
Jewish-German Dialogue
sponsored by the Center for German and European Studies
'Is it important for Jews to visit Germany?'
To travel to Germany continues to represent 
a problem 
for many American Jews, as such a visit might somehow be viewed as condoning the actions of Germany during WWII. We want to discuss what Jews experience visiting Germany today, and how Germans react to Jews' attitudes toward their country.
Tuesday March 4, 2008
from 5:30 - 7:30 p.m.
Rapaporte Treasure Hall,
Goldfarb Library
The event is open to the public
Wibke Bruhns: My Father's Country.
Author Wibke Bruns will speak at Brandeis on March 27 at 12noon in the Faculty Club Lounge.
Her book Meines Vaters Land will come out in English translation My Father's Country on May 6, 2008 with Random House.
Here are more details:
http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780307262813
About the author:
"Wibke Bruhns was born in 1938 in Halberstadt, Germany. She has worked
as a journalist in both TV and print and as a TV host and news
broadcaster. She was a correspondent for Stern magazine in the United
States and Israel and headed the culture section at one of Germany?s
largest radio stations, ORB. She has two grown daughters and now lives
and works as a freelance writer in Berlin."
sponsored by the Center for German and European Studies
Jewish-German Dialogue
'How Do Jews & Germans Learn From The Past?'
Join Members of Boston Area Jewish-German Dialogue Groups to discuss their experience with over a decade of German government sponsored trips to Berlin.Special Guests:
Antje Reichel (Museum Havelberg)
Jaroslav Szonka (Europäische Akademie Berlin)
Jaroslav Szonka has been in charge of organizing the program for these trips in Berlin since the program's inception. Antje Reichel is a curator at the Priglitz Museum in Havelberg, where (among many other responsibilities) she guides tours through the Cathedral, explaining the history of anti-Jewish artifacts to her (primarily Christian German) visitors.
Come join us for an interesting conversation !!!
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
from 5:30 pm to 7:30 pm:
Rapaporte Treasure Hall, in Goldfarb Library
Refreshments will be served
ANTJE REICHEL has been the Museologist of Priglitz-Museum Havelberg - since 1987. She is in charge of projects for museum education with children and adults, guided tours of museums, churches and towns, and archival investigations. Her field of research is the history of the Praemonstratensian, medieval religious buildings and the interior of churches, regional Jewish history, as well as the stained glass windows of the Cathedral in Havelberg.
JAROSLAV SZONKA has been in charge of programming at the 'Europäische Akademie' Berlin since 1995. Since 1996 he is also guest lecturer at the Institute for Media at Karlsuniversität in Prague. He is co-founder of the German-Chech Society in Frankfurt/Main, and member of Exil-PEN. Dr. Szonka studied Biology and Philosophy at the universities in Prague and Hamburg. Before turning to journalism he was a biomedical researcher for several years.