This conference will focus on urban housing as a place for anti-Jewish persecution. We hope to gather social scientists from various fields to confront various methods investigation and cases, in Reich cities but also in Western and Eastern European occupied cities.

Argument 

The History of the Holocaust has taken a spatial turn, borrowing concepts and tools from geography. Two recent edited collections are representative: Geographies of the Holocaust (Knowles et al. 2014) and Hitler’s Geographies (Giaccaria and Minca 2016). However, these recent local and spatial studies deal almost exclusively with the killing areas, camps, and ghettos. They pay less attention to the “ordinary” western and southeastern European cities where persecution proceeded in a looser space. Anti-Jewish persecution did not only happen in specifically designed or transformed spaces such as camps and ghettos. It invaded spaces of everyday life in European cities: public spaces, work places and private spaces such as homes. In this landscape not only Jews and agents of persecution appear but also their immediate residential environment: concierges, neighbors, nannies, landlords, property managers, sub-tenants, local administrations, etc. These figures have an essential place in the memories of Jewish survivors. Though, so far, scholars have hardly addressed their role. The spatial turn that occurred during the last fifteen years in Anglophone Holocaust studies focused on the symbolic places of genocide. Much work has been done on the looting and the seizure and reallocation of the apartments occupied by Jews, mainly in Reich's cities, but apartment blocks and ordinary cities as spaces of persecution, occupied territories and other Axis countries, the interactions with non-Jewish neighbors as well as spatial aspects are still in need of study. Recent work opened this new field of investigation. It inspired the conference to come.

This conference intends to bridge various perspectives and methods and focus on urban housing as a place for anti-Jewish persecution. We hope to gather social scientists from various fields to confront various methods investigation and cases, in Reich cities but also in Western and Eastern European occupied cities.

Inspired by the organizers’ current research on the Parisian case, the conference will deal with policies of seizure and reallocation of the apartments of the Jews in Paris, but will not be restricted to those questions.

Main topics

One page proposals for papers are invited that examine:

• the interlinkage between persecution and policies of housing / urban developments;
• the beneficiaries of the spoliation of urban housing;
• the interactions between Jews and non-Jews concerning the seizure of housing, its re-allocation and restitution after the liberation;
• the place of homes in the experiences of individuals (use of testimonies as such as the VHA collection welcome)

Submission guidelines 

To be sent to cparisdebollardiere@aup.edu and ericlebourhis@hotmail.com before July 12, 2017.

Answers will be given to the applicants by the end of July. 

Applications for grants for speakers from outside the Parisian region will be considered. 

Co-organized by:

The George and Irina Schaeffer Center for the Study of Genocide, Human Rights and Conflict Prevention, American University of Paris

Le Centre de Recherches Historiques, EHESS-CNRS

L'Institut de Sciences sociales du Politique, Université Paris Nanterre-ENS Paris Saclay-CNRS

Scientific and Organizing committee

• Isabelle Backouche (EHESS-CRH),
• Eric Le Bourhis (FMS-ISP),
• Shannon Fogg (Missouri S&T),
• Sarah Gensburger (CNRS-ISP),
• Constance Pâris de Bollardière (AUP),
• Brian Schiff (AUP).