The Koebner-Minerva Center for German History and the Hebrew University are pleased to invite you to the annual international conference "Criminality and Madness in Modern Germany", which will take place in Jerusalem, 27-28 May 2007.
The classification and treatment of crime and insanity manifest the desired social orders and fundamental values of the society that discusses and implements it. This year's conference covers a broad selection of topics related to crime and insanity: the legal definitions of crime and the differences between rationality and irrationality; the convoluted correlations between the emergence of mass consumption culture and new concepts of crime; the impact of the two World Wars on the perceptions of rationality and law breaking; the role of crime and insanity in the ideological discourse, and more. It is our hope that the interrelation of these topics in the conference facilitates a framework for renewed examination of this turbulent time period.
Planned Program
Sunday, May 27th
Goethe Institute, 15 Sokolov St.
18:00 Opening panel "Healing Crime and Madness from the Empire to the Third Reich"
Greetings: Moshe Zimmermann (Director of the Koebner Minerva Center)
Richard Wetzell (German History Institute, Washington DC): "Psychiatry and Criminal Justice in Modern Germany, 1890-1945"
Eric Engstrom (Freie Universität, Berlin): "Forensic Psychiatry in Imperial Germany"
Thomas Weber (University of Pennsylvania): "A Regiment of Heroes, a Regiment of Criminals: Adolf Hitler's Regiment in the First World War"
Shlomo Giora Shoham (Tel Aviv University): "Nazi Regime: Micro-Criminology and Holocaust: Macro-Victimology"
Monday, May 28th
Room 505, Beit Meirsdorf, Mt. Scopus, Hebrew University Campus
9:30-11:15 "Petty Crime: Women, Crooks and Drugs"
Chairman: Ofer Ashkenazi (The Hebrew University, Jerusalem)
Karsten Uhl (Technische Universität, Darmstadt): "Crime, Gender and Sanity: Women Shoplifting"
Tobias Simpson (Cambridge University): "Reinterpreting Youth Crime in Germany, 1904 - 1933"
Boaz Neumann (Tel Aviv University): "Philosophie des Als-Ob as a way of Life: Crooks and Frauds in the Weimar Republic"
Jonathan Lewy (Hebrew University, Jerusalem): "Nazis, Drugs and Anti-Socials"
Coffee Break
11:45-13:00 "Prisoner's Hallucinations: Reality and Imagination in German Prisons"
Chairman: Shlomo Giora Shoham (Tel Aviv University)
Ofer Ashkenazi (Hebrew University, Jerusalem): "Prisoners as Madmen in Weimar Cinema"
Veronika Springmann (Carl von Ossietzky Universität, Oldenburg): "Criminals and Calisthenics: Physical Exercise in the Weimar Prisons"
Nikolaus Wachsmann (London University): "Mental Illness in Nazi Prisons"
Lunch Break
14:30-16:30 "Madness and Crime in Popular Culture"
Chairman: Steven Aschheim (The Hebrew University, Jerusalem)
Daniel Siemens (Bielefeld Universität): "Explaining Crime: Berlin Newspapers and the Construction of the Criminal in Weimar Germany"
Sara Hall (University of Illinois, Chicago): "Rationalizing Modern Life: The Visual Codes of the Weimar Police Film"
Erika Hughes (University of Wisconsin, Madison): "Art and Illegality on the Weimar Stage: The Dances of Celly de Rheydt, Anita Berber and Valeska Gert"
Udi E. Greenberg (Hebrew University, Jerusalem): "The Criminalization of Society: Walter Benjamin and Carl Schmitt"
Refreshments will be served in all panels.
The conference is open to the public. No registration is required.
Contacts:
Dr. Ofer Ashkenazi
Mr. Udi E. Greenberg
Mr. Jonathan Lewy
E-mail: gaeseric@mscc.huji.ac.il
Phone: 02-588-0135 (between 10:00-14:00)
050-685-8652
054-202-5262