Alan Kraut is University Professor of History at American University. He is a specialist in U.S. immigration and ethnic history, and the author of Silent Travellers: Germs, Genes, and the "Immigrant Menace." Kraut offers some context for the politics of fear and xenophobia that often accompany immigration debates.
Despina Stratigakos is an architectural historian at the University at Buffalo. Her recent book Hitler at Home examines the efforts of Hitler's interior designer Gerdy Troost to cultivate Hitler's image as both a refined statesman and a man of the people.
Monika Schwarz-Friesel is a professor of linguistics at the Technical University Berlin. Her recent study---conducted with historian Yehuda Reinharz of Brandeis University---examines thousands of recent letters and emails sent to the Central Council of Jews in Germany and to the Israeli Embassy in Berlin. Their research reveals a surprising level of antisemitism among educated Germans.
We're surrounded by propaganda all the time: some of it benign, some of it dangerous. Propaganda was used to devastating effect during the Holocaust and it's worth studying to understand why and how we are vulnerable to propaganda in our everyday lives. This episode is a collage of people discussing their own relationship to propaganda, and the ways in which they guard against it
Hasan Sarbakhshian and Parvaneh Vahidmanesh gathered stories and photographs from Iran's dwindling Jewish population for their book Iranian Jews. The effort would eventually cause them to flee Iran, their homeland, for the United States.
Prof. Kathleen Blee has written several books about racism and the Ku Klux Klan. Blee looks in particular at ways the KKK was able to infiltrate mainstream America in the 1920s, by focusing its membership efforts on moderates, not extremists—a strategy repeated by the Nazis shortly thereafter.
An early adopter of computer culture, Mike Godwin noticed in online discussions an abundance of glib comparisons to Hitler and the Nazis. In response, he coined Godwin's Law, a modern adage intended to promote more thoughtful dialogue.
What Would You Do? captures the reactions of ordinary people to real-life dilemmas. While Rossen has sometimes been shocked by bigotry or ambivalence, she has also been inspired by people who take action.
Renee Hobbs is founder of the Media Education Lab at Temple University. Hobbs works to promote media literacy and critical thinking about information sources-which can be a powerful tool against hate speech and Holocaust denial.
Imam Mohamed Magid takes a strong stand against antisemitism and Holocaust denial and believes it's important for other Muslim leaders to do so as well.
Watch videos and read articles about the Holocaust and the conditions that made it possible.
