Issues in Holocaust Education

This original contribution to understanding the nature of Holocaust education in schools tackles an issue that has gained significant interest over the past decade, and is of increasing relevance due to a growing intolerance across Europe and elsewhere. The authors examine a range of issues including the need for Holocaust education, the factors that facilitate or inhibit its evolution, and the indifferent response of the antiracist movement to the attempted annihilation of European Jewry. The empirical content sheds light on the attitudes and practices of teachers and on the prospects of drawing on the Holocaust to further the goal of participatory democracy. The themes and illustrative research are discussed in the context of developments in two locations, the United Kingdom and Canada, and the findings will be germane to an international audience. The volume will prove invaluable to academics and policy makers concerned with social policy, sociology, education and history, as well as to teachers of the Holocaust.

About the Author

Dr Short is currently Reader in Educational Research at the University of Hertfordshire. For more than two decades he has researched and published in the fields of multicultural and antiracist education and, in 1989, co-authored (with Professor Bruce Carrington) Race and the Primary School. He has a longstanding interest in holocaust education having published widely in the area and addressed many international conferences. He has also acted as a consultant to the Council of Europe on its recent Holocaust education programme. Dr Reed is a former Director of the Holocaust Memorial and Education Centre in Toronto, Canada.