>> my name is kevin taylor. something i'm curious about. starting in 1933 it just seems like everything, the horros, all happened so quickly between '33 and after the war and, perhaps, before as well. i am wondering, is there any -- and this is for anyone in the panel. do you see any analogies, i guess the most important question is, do you see any analogies domestically in this country where something happens and the hair on the back of your neck stands up?

not this again or not this type of person. has that ever happened? >> just to comment, i'm not sure everybody in the panel would agree, but anti-semitism was never limited to germany. never limited to germany. when we came to this country, i can remember being pushed off sidewalks, having locks thrown at me, having been called a duty jewish bastard. this went on all the way through the late '40's easily. so, you know, in a certain sense there was obviously, hitler was a unique factor, but there was for at least the people i grew

up with an awareness of the problems that existed which existed for a long time. some of which strangely enough was a nostalgic for germany. many of the refugees went back. some never became americans. >> i happen to be reading a very

american book. it is called the hemmings of monticello. she writes magnificently. it is a very narrow book. she also speaks about the hemmings and jefferson and the times and having learned so much about my background and the holocaust and prejudice and whenever there were so many analogies between the laws of that time and the that united ss and what later happened in germany. and those laws that were prevalent in the united states were prevalent in europe before this race came to america. so they had a lot to pick up from, the nazis. they had a lot of documentation and material that they could learn from, which wasn't german. >> one more comment.

>> one more comment. last year sometime i heard a neighbor and an acquaintance of ours speak. he is a very distinguished professor at one of the universities here in washington. very much concerned with american policy and american life. he is jewish, and he has been in the state department and an adviser to various administrations. one of the points he made to us, he said, one thing i want to tell you is the honeymoon is over. the effect of the holocaust on anti-semitism in the world has dissipated. it is picking up. it is no longer dead, and it is no longer considered to be something one really doesn't talk about in polite society. he said it is back, and it is

back everywhere. so that the lesson that we hoped we have learned may not be fully learned. we will have to be forever vigilant. >> question over here. >> from the german institute. i want to start by thanking everyone for a very enlightening and moving presentation. my question is for the two editors. i was curious if you could tell us a little bit about how you arrived at the selection of sources in this book since i imagine it was not an easy process. i am curious to what extent you started with the sources and saw where they lead you or whether you, in a way, started with what you knew had to be covered. i am also curious as you did this work what was surprising to you, perhaps.

thank you. >> i think your answer is yes. meaning that the question is really an open one. we started with the sources and with a hypothesis or a perception as to how we wanted to go about it. once we got into the material things started to change. so it really is a process that is quite massive. i would like to use the term of methodology, but it really doesn't apply that well because, again, it is also, in a way, chaotic. what we had, the opportunity we had was to draw on this rich source of material we had here at the museum and other archives. that was really an incredible help. it did not help in telling us what to select from from this trove of materials. we basically went by the idea of presenting the story line that

would also work in conjunction with what we had in mind. if you looked at the book you would see. it has an integrated narrative that combines text and document. so it really is a book that you can read from cover to cover. you can also pick out the documents and just stick with back the documents. led to even more interactive process. the documents would speak to our narrative and the other way around. in a way we were guided by what we found, but we also then guided our search for material by our analysis. were we surprised by things? i think a lot. that is the case as far as i'm

concerned. there is also a surprising lack of material of the times that we tried to include here which is material generated at the time. one would think there is an awful lot. there is an awful lot, but not the kind of material that is really telling and describes the life situation of the people at the time. a lot of it is formalistic, repetitive. what do we do with that? on the other hand, this is not the perfect teaching tool. you need to find material that is attractive that raises questions. again, it provides a stimulus for further research, which is all we really had in mind. >> the idea for the whole series was nothing retrospective. he really fed it, there were certain levels where we had camps. we had nothing on youthful sexuality, yet jews who were still able in the crevices of

life, nevertheless. i was thinking perhaps we should break a principle. i must say i think it was great that he did that. it alters the whole character. there is no second guessing. there is no hindsight. it is simply how people read it at the time. some things were we did not have the document. obviously there are things that we search for that we couldn't. so there was an area with the was interesting. it is not in there. it is great that he stuck to the principle. the thing that most struck me was something that i referred to briefly. one knows about the association of germany as this new top organization. this kind of response. yes, this, perhaps, is the basis for future coexistence between jews and non schuss.

in some ways they had to respond like that. the way that people tended to read the organization is sort of believing it. for them to find out from this report where they say at the same time absolutely clear that the vast majority of our youth will have to seek their professional futures abroad, that really amazes me. i had not realized that at the very top this community is finished. we will do what we can for the older generation. maintaining our strength. the readership was really. that was very powerful.

i had not expected that. >> questions, please. >> i am a volunteer here at the museum. i guess i have a similar question. the jewish responses to persecution. the variety, it is a wonderful program. the variety of responses from ten year old children to grandfathers to the average person on the street to a jewish newspaper to a jewish organization. to us as readers how much weight should we give these responses? it seems to me, i would say, i would suggest, i would assert, that maybe what a 12 year-old is saying or a 17 year-old or a 30 year-old who just lost his job may be of more interest in some

ways what a jewish newspaper is saying or fear of the nazis reading it or for fear of further persecution as well as some of our jewish organizations. so when we read this book how much weight should we give these? at think we have to be careful, i would assert, in giving them all equal weight and all legal consequence. they are all of equal interest, i agree with that point. your comments. >> in reading this book i've year it is a snapshot of t of my different times and activities. i think the book covers all the basis, but unevenly, not even. it doesn't assign the same

amount of import to different things. but look at every snapshot with different reactions by different people. after all, the jewish community which i knew was a greatly differed community from the very orthodox to the very assimilated. christian feelings use. so you have this enormous range of opinion on a great many different activities. so looking at that and think you look at the very rich combination of testimonies. that is how i read it. i don't think i need to assign a certain weight to a certain testimonies because there is no way of knowing. it is not the scientific sample of how many people believe this versus how many people believe

something else. >> would you like to comment? >> i absolutely agree with what you just said. i would add, i think it really depends what question you are asking. for example, if you are asking which of the views that most shape the way in which jews, and they responded then we might well want to look behind the corridors for who is writing the reports and whose views filtered into the jewish newspaper articles. if we want to know what is publicly being said in the jews and we look at the newspapers. if we want to know what was the average view of the jew on the street we can rapidly find out. the experience is so variable between occupations, regions, generations, those who are more

visibly, more eastern jews. stake out on on the street. and often when we are looking at public opinion we are imagining some kind of a continuing between a broad groundswell out there and certain more elite organs which may be influenced by certain australian newspapers. and this is how the process, this is how the process goes. here we don't really have that because there are a lot of experiences that can't be fed into this. it isn't of free exchange. in that sense of a think one is forced to say, this is part of the diversity believe we have to recognize there isn't the average.

>> i would ascribe to everything that was asked and said. the name is to reflect diversity as much as the can. possible only to a limited degree. even if we add formal volumes we will get nowhere near the range and diversity that you find in historic reality. there is no attempt at being comprehensive. so these are the caveat that we have outlined in the series introduction. that is something than reader needs to be aware of. it is not a monograph series that tells an entire story. this is something to stimulate interest in further research. >> a follow-up to that question. >> even with in my own family the reaction was very diverse. but when you go back and think about what different people thought and also changed, of course, over time because as

things got worse people began to lose hope. whereas at the beginning we see there may have been some idea that would be a way of surviving. initially my father tried to convince members of his family and my mother's family to emigrate with us and found it very difficult. in fact, most of them therefore perished in the holocaust. >> can we say diversity is one of the lessons we have learned from this book? is a diversity of opinion among jews? >> that would be a great tool to achieve if that is a perception that reduced, with. we definitely wanted to go against this. so far we wanted to break up what had been presented as a

consensus and to really stretch the spectrum as much as we could. >> the gist of final question i wanted to ask you to reflect a little bit about how you see the series changing the way that the holocaust is taught or the way it is researched on the university level. >> well, i guess there are basically two ways. the stimulus factor. if we are going to put out these teasers for people to get into topics and find material that speaks to a certain aspects that, in itself, has a, if you like, in reviving aspect. in terms of what we ourselves present it is pretty much up to the reader to take away. we gain some insight that we did not expect to gain at the beginning. so there is, i guess, quite a

bit and there in terms of individual documents as well as the composition of them in combining one volume in the indoor five volumes in the series. >> well, who should i presume to say. even though we know that it is obviously a horrible fiction nevertheless one of the teaching test that is driven by nazi policy, you tend to assume an abstraction. the uniform individual that they were imagining. even though we know that is completely bogus the reality does not emerge from the text which are available at the moment. here with such a rich profusion of real individuals thinking so often so cogently or personally about their concrete experiences

or what is happening on a larger scale, i think if it is really used properly that will completely alter the sense and create a canter image of a veryl and diverse community, but with certain kinds of the centers and sectors intended to be caught up in this maelstrom. ultimately it is the power this. yet we, i think, you know, find in all sorts of areas there was a certain degree of agency, of being able to shape your place. again one then, the later volumes will be very important for this. that notion of going will be definitively be imprudent. >> i want to add something to this. as a survivor and a guide in the

museum here i think because we know what happened during the holocaust, everything, much of what goes on here is really geared toward the later years and the worst. we know quite a bit about hitler's rise to power, but i'd think we know very, very that'll about the jewish responses to this. and therefore had think this particular volume is so important because it takes us back to where it began and where one could really see the progression that is by and large, at least to my limited knowledge kind of lost. i was really very impressed and very pleased. nine very first inklings of what was going on in germany. so i feel greatly enriched by

this volume. >> i want to add to that if i may. i am so pleased and so grateful to both authors and people involved to finally bring something to the holocaust museum that teaches people that the holocaust didn't begin in 1939 when the war broke out. there were six years of absolute torment in germany for the jews when no one helped and no one heard them and no one cared. countries would not open up. people got out somehow, but very slowly. many of the german jews went to countries surrounding germany and were caught up and murdered. and in that chapter of history is an enormous lesson. when it came to the invasion of poland and the way the nazis

went into those countries, into czechoslovakia, even into austria and into poland it was too late. the signs were there from january 30th 1933. nobody listened. they did not even listen to the people that left her told them what would happen. in fact, in germany my parents told me that there were people who went to the concentration camps early and came out and tried to tell people in the community what happened to them and what was happening. they were furious at him. denial. there would not listen. the this part of history, enormously the important for the future. if you wait for the bad stuff to start striking it is too late.

>> and died in the museum. for those of you who are here and have not gone to our permanent exhibit, can you hear me all right? those of you who have not gone to our permanent exhibit, the fourth four, this book is the whole for four. i really would recommend that you steady or go on the 44. i would like for you to see all of the things that we talked about here are all on the 44. i would like to add just disagree with you of the bit because you had said this all happened so suddenly and so quick. it did not happen suddenly. if you're going to the permanent exhibit you will see that hitler and the nazi movement grew very gradually. it started when he came into power. and then all of these different, these different persecution's happened very gradually so that

in 1939 he was able, the nazis were able to do what they did. so it was a time of six years. it was not very fast. it was gradual. for those of you here, i hope you have a wonderful learning experience on our fourth floor today. >> please tell your friends about the book that has been written and to come back. >> i would like to thank all of our panelists. it wonderful and eliminating and moving program this rogram this. [applauding] and for those of you -- >> for more information visit ushmm.org. >> a professor of anthropology at the university of wisconsin in madison. she has written another book. this one is kamikaze diaries,

reflections of japanese students soldiers. professor, where did the term kamikaze come from? >> it originated when the mongrels tried to invade japan. they came twice. they were going to really land and then storm came. all of the ships overturned. that is that japan was saved, so to speak. therefore they said that this was god's wind. >> is that what, cousin means? >> every character has more than one. two characters for kamikaze. usually called a shintu. >> what does that mean? >> the same thing.

just different. >> when did the japanese military start to use the term kamikaze? or is that an english term that we use? >> the shintu has been used, but in a particular operation. i think there are two distinct, what you call kamikaze. one is pearl harbor. that was very different. submarine was waiting for them to return. so that was a very different one. but the one is at the very end of the war. everybody knew japan had absolutely no chance of winning and so the vice admiral of the navy came up with a very crazy idea. almost the nuclear age.

he thought the only means left for japan was to use this japanese sol, which is uniquely prepared then to face death without hesitation. he came up with this one mission. and by that time that government had to shorten the university years twice. so in education everybody has to be drafted. so the pilots, about 4,000 perished. 3,000 were boy pilots. they were trained very early. they were much more susceptible to propaganda. nobody really, i don't think, died without hesitation. we don't have any records.

intellectual cream of the crop. there were graduates of the university of tokyo and other top universities. at that time students read latin, greek, german, french philosophy, literature, all of that in their original languages. so they were enormously well educated, and they did not have a choice but volunteered. >> not truly volunteers. >> that's right. so i went through the diaries. what is fascinating, of course, at some point they feel they should really protect their own country. sometimes they feel of the otheo their women, usually mothers would be raped and all that. allt