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MEDIA RESOURCES
Conference Panels
On Tuesday, October 17th, at 4 p.m. students and faculty conducted a roundtable at UF Hillel which featured students from the University of Florida and from Florida State who have researched the famous Rosenstrasse protest and its implications. Another roundtable was comprised of faculty members from each university who discussed forms of protest, the Holocaust, and its meaning for our own years. In February 1943, German women married to Jewish men protested their husbands’ detention and impending deportation. The Nazi government blinked, releasing the husbands. The Rosenstrasse protest, named for the street in central Berlin where the men were held, was the only protest in Germany against the deportation of the Jews. It shines a mirror on the remainder of German society under Hitler, but it also carries lessons concerning social engagement and protest for our own day.
Sponsored by: The Bud Shorstein Center for Jewish Studies, The Rosenstrasse Foundation, UF Hillel, and Florida State University
The Rosenstrasse Foundation hosted a commemoration event on March 31st at Florida State University in coordination with our series of international conference programs focused on commemorating the 80th anniversary of of the Rosenstrasse protest. This conference focused on ideas of expressing dissent and civil courage by mobilizing grassroots opposition against dictatorships and democracies in decay and which aims to explore the role of civil courage in promoting democracy and civil rights in modern society. The event featured a panel of speakers, as well as research posters and exhibits curated by the foundation and its student researchers. Speakers included Dr. Rohlinger, Professor of Sociology at Florida State University, who researches mass media, political participation, and politics in America, and also serves as the Associate Dean for Faculty Development and Community Engagement, as well as Research Director for FSU's Institute of Politics; Mark Schlakman of FSU's Center for the Advancement of Human Rights; Nathan Stoltzfus, Rintels Professor of Holocaust Studies at Florida State University; and Danielle Wirsansky, a PhD student at Florida State University studying Modern European History who has been awarded the Greatest Generation (Baumgarten & Gibbons) Fellowship and specializes in using Theatre as medium for Public History.
80th Anniversary - March 8th
On March 8th at 6:30pm, International Women’s Day, the German Embassy sponsored a commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the Rosenstrasse Protest, which was held at the Goethe Institute in Washington, DC. Her Excellency Emily Haber, the German Ambassador to the United States, opened the meeting with remarks, followed by the moral philosopher, cultural commentator, and author Susan Neiman, who was the director of the Einstein Forum in Berlin at the time. Dr. Edna Friedberg, a historian and senior program curator at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, also spoke. A panel followed, moderated by Michael Brenner, Distinguished Professor of History and Abensohn Chair in Israel Studies at American University, with author and descendant Ruth Wiseman, and Nathan Stoltzfus, Rintels Professor of Holocaust Studies at Florida State University, as participants. An exhibit curated by the Goethe Institute was presented by Dr. Mordecai Paldiel, former director of Yad Vashem’s Department of the Righteous, and co-founder with Nathan Stoltzfus of the Rosenstrasse Foundation. Dr. Jessica Hammer (Carnegie Mellon University) and Moyra Turkington (Unruly Designs) had arranged a display of their Holocaust education game Rosenstrasse, which was based on the protest. Moyra Turkington was on hand to present posters and demonstrate the game.
A commemoration event for the 80th Anniversary was held at Berlin's Marienkirche, located around the corner from Rosenstrasse in the heart of Berlin, and the location of the protest 80 years ago. March 6 was the day most Jews imprisoned at Rosenstrasse 2-4 were released in 1943 and is also the European Day of the Righteous established by the European Parliament to commemorate the moral courage of those who defied tyranny to stand up for those targeted for persecution and murder. Speakers included distinguished diplomat and scholar Amy Gutmann, United States Ambassador to Germany and former University of Pennsylvania President, as well as Eva Menasse, an outstanding journalist and writer who has received, among other prizes, the Corine Literature Prize, the Heinrich Böll Prize, the Austrian Book Prize, and the Ludwig Börne Prize. Descendants were also represented and a dramatic reading from “Widerstand des Herzens” by Nathan Stoltzfus held by Gregorij von Leitis.
Virtual Panel Discussion with Nathan Stoltzfus, the Dorothy and Jonathan Rintels Professor of Holocaust Studies at Florida State University; Ruth Wiseman, daughter of Dr. Rita Jenny Kuhn, who was detained at Rosenstraße; Mordecai Paldiel, former head of the Righteous Among the Nations Department at Yad Vashem; and Moyra Turkington, creator of the educational role-playing game Rosenstrasse, discuss the history of Rosenstrasse and why it is important to study today during the 80th Commemoration Event hosted by the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York.
Panel Discussion with Guenter Bischof, “After the Anschluss" and Nathan Stoltzfus, "Defiance and Fundamental Rescue," November 17, 2022, The National WWII Museum 15th International Conference, Chair - Jason Dawsey.
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