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Quellen und Schrifttum zur Kulturgeschichte des Wiehengebirgsraumes A [ISSN 0947-4668] Edited by Heinz-Ulrich Kammeier, Wolfgang Riechmann and Bert Wiegel

[ QSKW A 7 ]

Jewish history in Levern (Germany) and its surroundings 1800-1938.

Stefanie Hillebrand
With contributions by Thomas Horst and Diethard Aschoff

[Table of Contents] [Contributions]

This title is also available as paperback.

The author investigates the fates of eleven local Jewish families and other Jews in the course of the 19th and early 20th century. On this occasion, the demography, the living conditions, the economic and occupational position, the cultural and religious life, and the relation between Jews and Christians is analysed. The main occupation of rural Jews until the 1930s was cattle dealing. Their lives were characterized by the tension between their religious obligation towards birth and ancestors and an increasing sense of home in Germany and their home village. The mixed living of Christians and Jews became more and more positive until the Weimar Republic, because of historical deep rootedness, professional reputation, and good neighbourliness. However, there was no cultural exchange, mutual enrichment, nor a true understanding of the other one. Mutual scepticism remained, although "white Jews" as opposed to orthodox Jews did not distinguish themselves from the Germans in language or dress. From the fact that the anti-Semitic agitation of the Nazis was absorbed immediately, it becomes clear that the assimilation and acculturation of the Jews was a pseudo-emancipation. The Jewish history of Levern ended in 1938 with the majority of Jews not immediately emigrating, but first hiding in towns and later leaving Germany or being deported and murdered in concentration camps. The book also contains a bibliography, a glossary of specialist terms, family trees, a register of persons, an index of Jewish gravestones, and an appendix of source material.

Content:	152 pages, 23 illustrations, 1 map		Cover:	Hardcover
Text:	German		Size:	16 x 24 cm (Gr. 8°)
Abstracts in other languages:	none		weight:
Keywords:	cultural history, demography, emancipation, Jews, religion		Series:	Quellen und Schrifttum zur Kulturgeschichte des Wiehengebirgsraumes A
			ISSN:	0947-4668
MA thesis	Universität Osnabrück, 1993		ISBN-13:
			ISBN-10:
			Place of Publication:	Espelkamp
			Date of Publication:	1996