- Research Germany under Hitler’s reign. Look into the politics of the time, the class separation, treatment of the Jewish, the position of women and their roles, and uncover any other important information.
- Cover some of the similarities and differences between Germany in the 1939 – 1943 and the present day.
- Discuss the setting of Molching, Germany; write about the way in which the town is ‘separated’ and how the setting is influential in presenting the text’s ideas.
Nazi Germany was led by the NSDAP, under Adolf Hitler’s reign. Hitler turned the liberal Weimar democracy into a totalitarian dictatorship, by legally becoming Chancellor in 1933 and taking control of Germany through Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution. He then created laws to enable him to act without the President and the Reichstag ( government) and suspended many of the civil rights of German people.
The Nazi Party used propaganda to ensure that the people blindly followed the Nazi Movement and were open to their ideas.
After WW1, the Germany nation was humiliated and punished, which resulted in a feeling of exclusion from international affairs and bitter resentment in the German people. When Adolf Hitler became an influential figure in German politics, he had a way of making people feel like the belonged, were safe in the Nazis power and their anger unified them.
The Nazis used Propaganda to persuade the people to accept the Nazi ideas and believe that Hitler had their interests at heart. Through patriotic rallies and speeches, youth groups and clubs, the Nazi ideologies were placed into every aspect of German life, and to them, the Nazis were doing good and making Germany great again. Hitler used words to convince people of his ideas, and in the book thief,the power of words …
Add in ides of
– Zusak presents an optimistic view that language ( literature, speech etc.) can save us, but can be manipulated so easily to do the opposite.
– dehumanizing propaganda
– the only way to solve their problems is by removing aspects of society
– using the despair of the people to make them believe they want to commit these horrible things because it is fixing the problem.
– easily mislead, especially when we are told in an authoritative form
– it’s hard to speak up and disagree when people in authority are persecuting others because you don’t want to make yourself vulnerable and open to persecution. Fear of the authority
– subversive , undermining societys.
– Dog whistle phrases/politics (Dog-whistle politics is political messaging employing coded language that appears to mean one thing to the general population but has an additional, different, or more specific resonance for a targeted subgroup)
Among other things, the Nazis wanted to restore Germany to its former glory through removing racial impurities ( Jewish, communists, sick, disabled) and having a superior German people.
They convinced people that Jewish were the biggest threat to racial purity and the survival of the state. Jewish people were shamed, abused, discriminated and excluded from society, and the Nazis made a target for the German people to aim their anger towards and with a common enemy the people were united even more, which allowed the Nazis to carry out horrifying things to the Jewish and other members of society.
They believed in theories of racial purity and decided that the Aryan were the master race. Nazis wanted to overcome social divisions of class and have everyone the same, by removing all of the impurities.
Women were excluded from the political life of Germany and pushed towards the traditional roles of wife and mother.
In September 1939, Germany started WW2 by invading Poland, whom Great Britain had sworn to protect if they were invaded by Germany.
In the Book Thief, Liesel arrived on Himmel st in January of 1939 and lived in Molching during the war. Mölching was described as being outside of Munich, however, in real life, Mölching does not actually exist.
Munich was the capital of the Nazi movement and //en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_Germany#World_War_II
http://www.thirdreichruins.com/munich.htm
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