Holocaust Education 25 Years On : Challenges, Issues, Opportunities

This volume presents a systematic reflection on the forms and the limitations of English children’s knowledge about the Holocaust and of English Holocaust education resources by reporting ground-breaking empirical research conducted by the UCL Centre for Holocaust Education. These research findings are contextualised historiographically and comparatively, drawing on history, education and memory studies perspectives from England, America, Switzerland and Germany. This book was originally published as a Special Issue of Holocaust Studies: A Journal of Culture and History.

The year 2016 marked the twenty-fifth anniversary of statutory teaching and learning about the Holocaust in English state-maintained schools, which was introduced with the first English National Curriculum in 1991. The year 2016 also saw the publication of the largest empirical research study on Holocaust education outcomes – the UCL Centre for Holocaust Education’s What Do Students Know and Understand About the Holocaust?

This book presents a systematic reflection on the outcomes of this quarter-century of Holocaust education in England and the Centre’s wider work to reflect on the forms and the limitations of children’s knowledge about the Holocaust and of English Holocaust education resources. These papers are then contextualised in two ways: through papers that situate English Holocaust education historiographically and in England’s wider Holocaust culture; and through papers from America, Switzerland, and Germany that place the UCL Centre for Holocaust Education’s findings in a wider and comparative perspective. Overall, the book presents unique empirical insights into teaching and learning processes and outcomes in Holocaust education and enables these to be theorised and explored systematically.

The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of Holocaust Studies: A Journal of Culture and History.