‘Decentering Auschwitz’ has long been a goal of scholarship and civic initiatives focusing on the history and memory of the Holocaust. Recognizing the diversity of experience across German-occupied Europe, understanding the dynamics of violence, and acknowledging the long-term legacies of the Nazi genocide in various regions have given rise to a more comprehensive and complex understanding of the Holocaust. The presentation offers a survey of recent insights and emphasizes the value of bringing together the methodologies of Holocaust Studies, East European Studies, and the Spatial Humanities

June 22, 1941 marked the start of Operation Barbarossa, codename for the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, and it became a turning point in the Nazi policy of annihilation of the Jews of Europe.  Before any of the killing centers became operational, thousands of Jews had already been murdered by bullets in the fields, forests and ravines of the former Soviet Union. Men, women, and children were led right outside the towns in which they lived, murdered, before the eyes of their neighbors, and buried in mass graves, many of which remain unmarked to this day.

Between 1941 and 1944, over 2 million Jewish victims perished in what we call today the Holocaust by bullets. Over the years, Babyn Yar has become an iconic representation of this history. There are, however, thousands of sites like this infamous ravine, scattered all across Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Latvia, Russia, and other countries of the former Soviet Union.

Dr. Walke’s presentation is supported by the MCHE Jack Mandelbaum Holocaust Education Fund.