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War and Genocide

A Concise History of the Holocaust, Fourth Edition

Doris L. Bergen

In examining one of the defining events of the twentieth century, Doris L. Bergen situates the Holocaust in its historical, political, social, cultural, and military contexts. Unlike many other treatments of the Holocaust, this revised, fourth edition discusses not only the persecution of Jews, but also other groups targeted by the Nazis: people with disabilities, Roma, queer people, Poles in leadership positions, Soviet POWs, and others deemed unwanted. In clear and eloquent prose, Bergen explores the two interconnected goals that drove the Nazi German program of conquest and genocide—purification of the so-called Aryan race and expansion of its living space—and invites readers to reflect on how the Holocaust connects to histories of violence around the world. Replete with firsthand accounts from victims, survivors, and eyewitnesses, this book is immediate, human, and eminently readable.

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  • TOC
  • TOC
  • Reviews
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  • Features
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  • Resources
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Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Pages: 440 • Trim: 6¼ x 9¼
978-1-5381-7805-8 • Hardback • August 2024 • $95.00 • (£73.00)
978-1-5381-7806-5 • Paperback • August 2024 • $42.00 • (£35.00)
978-1-5381-7807-2 • eBook • July 2024 • $39.00 • (£30.00)
Subjects: History / Holocaust, History / Wars & Conflicts / World War II / European Theater
Courses: History; World History; World War 2, History; Europe; Holocaust, History; Europe; 20th century

Doris L. Bergen is the Chancellor Rose and Ray Wolfe Professor of Holocaust Studies at the University of Toronto. She has been researching and teaching about the Holocaust for thirty-five years.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

List of Illustrations and Photo Credits

List of Maps

Introduction Holocaust, War, and Genocide Themes and Problems

1 Dry Timber Preconditions

2 Leadership and Will Hitler, the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, and Nazi Ideology

3 From Revolution to Routine Nazi Germany, 1933–1938

4 Open Aggression In Search of War, 1938–1939

5 Brutal Innovations War against Poland and Ghettoization of Jews, 1939–1940

6 Escalation and Expansion The Program to Kill People with Disabilities and the War in the West, 1939-1941

7 The War of Annihilation, 1941-1943

8 Flashover: The Peak Years of Killing Jews, 1942–1943

9 Death Throes and Killing Frenzies, 1944–1945

Conclusion: Legacies of Atrocity

Index

About the Author

Doris Bergen’s War and Genocide has long served as an excellent introduction to the history of the Holocaust. Clearly and engagingly written, the book combines sweeping historical analysis with insightful stories of how ordinary people experienced these terrible events. This new edition integrates up-to-date research in the field and includes expanded consideration of the Holocaust in comparison with other genocides.


— Alan E. Steinweis, University of Vermont


Bergen’s outstanding volume on the Holocaust has been made even better in this new edition. The emphasis on genocide as a process that must center on the complexity of humanity itself forms the core critical contribution of the book. To this, Bergen has added rich new materials and sources, including important visual material from Jewish victims and survivors. Her subtle but accessible text remains the model for approaching this difficult history.


— Paul B. Jaskot, Duke University


Written by one of the field’s leading scholars in a beautiful and easy to read style, this book is remarkably comprehensive, and impressively up-to-date on evolving scholarship. It covers all the important themes and trends in Holocaust history over the last forty years, as well as all of the geographic areas. The book also brings in personal stories of victims and survivors. It makes my class much richer and easier to teach; War and Genocide is beyond compare.


— Laurie Marhoefer, University of Washington


In this fourth edition of War and Genocide, Doris Bergen integrates new insights from scholarly research into the Holocaust, making it accessible to a wider readership, and showing how our understanding of this enormous event keeps evolving. In doing so, Bergen broadens the book’s geographical scope to include the Middle East; draws revealing links between the Holocaust, colonialism, eugenics, racism, and modern forms of warfare; and gives voice to a spectrum of individual people. A brilliant educator, Bergen thoughtfully and clearly, guides readers to consider how events and individual fates are “similar to, distinct from, and connected to” each other as well as the place of the Holocaust within a broader global human history of genocide.


— Tatjana Lichtenstein, The University of Texas at Austin


The complete bibliography can be found here.

- Updated literature to highlight recent scholarship

- Updated vocabulary, as well as added discussion of issues around labels and terminology

- A more intersectional approach to the Holocaust involving Jews, people with disabilities, LGBTQ2S+ people, Roma, and Black people

- Added framing to situate the Holocaust in the "world history of genocide" and help readers make connections across time and space

- Two new maps (the one of Treblinka killing center is part of a significantly expanded discussion of that key site)

- Thirty new images, including drawings, sketches, cartoons, and paintings. These materials are part of a concerted effort to "reverse the gaze" to help readers look out through the eyes of victims rather than perpetrators

- Added footnotes

- Online bibliography organized thematically



FOR PROFESSORS
Ancillary Materials are available for this title. For access to these professor use only materials, please Sign-In if you are a registered user, or Register then email us at rltextbooks@bloomsbury.com
Instructor's Manual. For each chapter, this valuable resource provides a variety of tools such as lecture outlines, student learning objectives, discussion questions, and other resources to simplify classroom preparation.
Lecture Notes. The Lecture Notes provide the tables and figures from the text.

War and Genocide

A Concise History of the Holocaust, Fourth Edition

Cover Image
Hardback
Paperback
eBook
Summary
Summary
  • In examining one of the defining events of the twentieth century, Doris L. Bergen situates the Holocaust in its historical, political, social, cultural, and military contexts. Unlike many other treatments of the Holocaust, this revised, fourth edition discusses not only the persecution of Jews, but also other groups targeted by the Nazis: people with disabilities, Roma, queer people, Poles in leadership positions, Soviet POWs, and others deemed unwanted. In clear and eloquent prose, Bergen explores the two interconnected goals that drove the Nazi German program of conquest and genocide—purification of the so-called Aryan race and expansion of its living space—and invites readers to reflect on how the Holocaust connects to histories of violence around the world. Replete with firsthand accounts from victims, survivors, and eyewitnesses, this book is immediate, human, and eminently readable.

Details
Details
  • Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
    Pages: 440 • Trim: 6¼ x 9¼
    978-1-5381-7805-8 • Hardback • August 2024 • $95.00 • (£73.00)
    978-1-5381-7806-5 • Paperback • August 2024 • $42.00 • (£35.00)
    978-1-5381-7807-2 • eBook • July 2024 • $39.00 • (£30.00)
    Subjects: History / Holocaust, History / Wars & Conflicts / World War II / European Theater
    Courses: History; World History; World War 2, History; Europe; Holocaust, History; Europe; 20th century
Author
Author
  • Doris L. Bergen is the Chancellor Rose and Ray Wolfe Professor of Holocaust Studies at the University of Toronto. She has been researching and teaching about the Holocaust for thirty-five years.

Table of Contents
Table of Contents
  • Table of Contents

    Acknowledgments

    List of Illustrations and Photo Credits

    List of Maps

    Introduction Holocaust, War, and Genocide Themes and Problems

    1 Dry Timber Preconditions

    2 Leadership and Will Hitler, the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, and Nazi Ideology

    3 From Revolution to Routine Nazi Germany, 1933–1938

    4 Open Aggression In Search of War, 1938–1939

    5 Brutal Innovations War against Poland and Ghettoization of Jews, 1939–1940

    6 Escalation and Expansion The Program to Kill People with Disabilities and the War in the West, 1939-1941

    7 The War of Annihilation, 1941-1943

    8 Flashover: The Peak Years of Killing Jews, 1942–1943

    9 Death Throes and Killing Frenzies, 1944–1945

    Conclusion: Legacies of Atrocity

    Index

    About the Author

Reviews
Reviews
  • Doris Bergen’s War and Genocide has long served as an excellent introduction to the history of the Holocaust. Clearly and engagingly written, the book combines sweeping historical analysis with insightful stories of how ordinary people experienced these terrible events. This new edition integrates up-to-date research in the field and includes expanded consideration of the Holocaust in comparison with other genocides.


    — Alan E. Steinweis, University of Vermont


    Bergen’s outstanding volume on the Holocaust has been made even better in this new edition. The emphasis on genocide as a process that must center on the complexity of humanity itself forms the core critical contribution of the book. To this, Bergen has added rich new materials and sources, including important visual material from Jewish victims and survivors. Her subtle but accessible text remains the model for approaching this difficult history.


    — Paul B. Jaskot, Duke University


    Written by one of the field’s leading scholars in a beautiful and easy to read style, this book is remarkably comprehensive, and impressively up-to-date on evolving scholarship. It covers all the important themes and trends in Holocaust history over the last forty years, as well as all of the geographic areas. The book also brings in personal stories of victims and survivors. It makes my class much richer and easier to teach; War and Genocide is beyond compare.


    — Laurie Marhoefer, University of Washington


    In this fourth edition of War and Genocide, Doris Bergen integrates new insights from scholarly research into the Holocaust, making it accessible to a wider readership, and showing how our understanding of this enormous event keeps evolving. In doing so, Bergen broadens the book’s geographical scope to include the Middle East; draws revealing links between the Holocaust, colonialism, eugenics, racism, and modern forms of warfare; and gives voice to a spectrum of individual people. A brilliant educator, Bergen thoughtfully and clearly, guides readers to consider how events and individual fates are “similar to, distinct from, and connected to” each other as well as the place of the Holocaust within a broader global human history of genocide.


    — Tatjana Lichtenstein, The University of Texas at Austin


Features
Features
  • The complete bibliography can be found here.

    - Updated literature to highlight recent scholarship

    - Updated vocabulary, as well as added discussion of issues around labels and terminology

    - A more intersectional approach to the Holocaust involving Jews, people with disabilities, LGBTQ2S+ people, Roma, and Black people

    - Added framing to situate the Holocaust in the "world history of genocide" and help readers make connections across time and space

    - Two new maps (the one of Treblinka killing center is part of a significantly expanded discussion of that key site)

    - Thirty new images, including drawings, sketches, cartoons, and paintings. These materials are part of a concerted effort to "reverse the gaze" to help readers look out through the eyes of victims rather than perpetrators

    - Added footnotes

    - Online bibliography organized thematically



Resources
Resources
  • FOR PROFESSORS
    Ancillary Materials are available for this title. For access to these professor use only materials, please Sign-In if you are a registered user, or Register then email us at rltextbooks@bloomsbury.com
    Instructor's Manual. For each chapter, this valuable resource provides a variety of tools such as lecture outlines, student learning objectives, discussion questions, and other resources to simplify classroom preparation.
    Lecture Notes. The Lecture Notes provide the tables and figures from the text.

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