1 August 2012: A study about the way in which the Holocaust is handled in schools worldwide
How do schools worldwide handle the Holocaust as a subject? In what areas of the world does the Holocaust form part of classroom teaching? Answers to these questions are to be provided by a project set up by the Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research in Braunschweig together with UNESCO. The project, entitled ‘International Status of Education on the Holocaust.A Global Mapping of Textbooks and Curricula’, will for the first time make it possible to compare representations of the Holocaust in school textbooks and national curricula.
The study will begin with a quantitative assessment of curricula from 195 countries, showing where and to what extent the Holocaust is established in official guidelines. The result will take the form of a global mapping, illustrating how the Holocaust should be dealt with in schools worldwide.
Are representations of the Holocaust nuanced, comprehensive and unbiased? In what contexts do they appear? And are there national and regional differences between them? In order to explore these questions, school textbooks from twenty representative countries will be examined qualitatively in close detail and compared with one another.
On the basis of this unprecedented global survey of education about the Holocaust and the recommendations which emerge from it, the Georg Eckert Institute will provide educational policy makers with a grounding for future decisions concerning curricula. This is of particular concern to countries in which the Holocaust has not previously featured in the curriculum.
Worldwide cooperation
The project is international in scope. Thanks to the cooperation of numerous research centres and experts, as well as the support of ministries of education throughout the world, the study will draw on data from countries in which no or little information about representations of the Holocaust has previously been made available.
The duration of the project is eighteen months and will be carried out jointly by UNESCO and the Georg Eckert Institute.
The Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research (GEI) analyses textbooks and other educational media with an emphasis on cultural studies and history. It also advises national and international educational stakeholders and provides support to scholars on the basis of its infrastructure services and its unique library. The GEI is on the way to becoming an international centre of competence for research into educational media. It is a member of the Leibniz Association.
Contact
Regina Peper
Press and Public Relations Officer
Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research
Celler Strasse 3
38114 Braunschweig
Tel.: 0531-59099-54
Email: peper(at)gei.de
www.gei.de
