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MAHolocaust Studies

More information

royalholloway.ac.uk/..locaust-studies.aspx 

Overview

Interested? To learn more about this study programme, entry requirements and application process, please contact one of our consultants in a country nearest to you.

Programme structure

Core modules
History of the Holocaust
In this module you will develop an understanding of the basic issues with regard to historical debate about the Holocaust. You will look at the nature of the roles of ideological, structural and other factors in the emergence and implementation of the Holocaust. You will examine the history of the Jews from the emancipation period onwards, considering the emergence of political antisemitism in Germany and Austria, the rise to power of Nazism, the Euthanasia Programme and its relationship with the persecution of the Jews, and Nazi policy vis-à-vis the Jews and other victims, including Afro-Germans, homosexuals, and Soviet prisoners of war. You will evaluate the Holocaust from the point of view of Nazi persecution and the responses of its victims.

Interpreting the Holocaust
In this module you will develop an understanding of the theoretical approaches to the Holocaust. You will look at the ways in which historians’ positions and use of sources are influenced by their theoretical and methodological assumptions. You will examine the ways in which sociological and anthropological texts, testimony and memoir, film, art, photography, comics, museums and monuments relating to the Holocaust are handled. You will consider the key theoretical explanations for the Holocaust, suchas modernity and genocide, the politics of Holocaust memory, and contemporary discussions about memorialisation.

Dissertation
You will carry out an extended piece of research. You will be appointed a member of academic staff who will act as your supervsior, providing you with support and guidance. You will produce a written report of between 10,400 and 16,000 words in length.

Optional modules
In addition to these mandatory course units there are a number of optional course units available during your degree studies. The following is a selection of optional course units that are likely to be available. Please note that although the College will keep changes to a minimum, new units may be offered or existing units may be withdrawn, for example, in response to a change in staff. Applicants will be informed if any significant changes need to be made.

Representing the Holocaust in British and American Literature
In this module you will develop an understanding of how the Holocaust is represented in British and American Literature. You will look at significant translated works, and examine issues such as form, the ethics of representation, the role of testimony, the construction of Jewish identity after the Holocaust, and the relationship between literature and history.

Film,Television and The Holocaust
In this module you will develop an understanding of how the destruction of European Jewry by the Nazis between 1933 and 1945 has been represented and responded to across a range of both fictional and non-fictional media. You will looks at the specific theoretical debates surrounding how the Holocaust can or should (or should not) be represented in art and popular culture. You will consider the role of mass media in constructing both popular and elite relationships to historical experience, and in documenting history.

A Transnational Holocaust
In this module you will develop an understanding of the history, impact and memory of forced movement of Jewish victims of the Nazi regime outside of the familiar places of ghettos and camps. You will look at the transnational and translocal history of the Holocaust, beginning in the mid-1920s and concluding in the early 1950s, including the founding of Israel, the esetablishment of the Displaced Persons Act in the USA, the division of Germany, and the UN refugee convention. You will examine the journeys and experiences of victims of forced movement and their emerging spatial agency in new locations, and also focus on the geo-political contexts of the locations they moved through and stayed in. You will consider emerging research in Holocaust studies on refugee diasporas, transnationalism, and landscapes of the Holocaust, and analyse literature on postwar Europe, humanitarian relief organizations, and histories of asylum seeking pertinent to Jewish, European and as relevant, refugee diasporas in regional locations of Africa, the Caribbean and South America.

Genocide – Comparative Approaches
In this module you will develop an understanding of the comparative approaches to the study of genocide. You will examine comparative themes central to modern scholarship, such as modernity, state violence, and gender, and others arising from the phenomenon itself, such as child transfers and the use of memories of past violence to justify genocide in the present. You will consider the complex causes and dynamics of genocide, with case studies analysing colonial genocide in North America and Australia, and the mass killings in Darfur at the beginning of the 21st century.

Career opportunities

On completion of your MA in Holocaust Studies at Royal Holloway you will have developed and finessed skills, such as research, analysis and presenting, which will appeal to future employers. Your degree also demonstrates that you enjoy being challenged and that you understand complex issues. On graduation you will be ideally placed to develop your career in areas relating to the Holocaust and have a solid foundation for PhD studies.

Apply now! Fall semester 2023/24
Application period has ended
Notes
Please see the university profile or contact us for the deadlines that apply to you
Apply now! Fall semester 2023/24
Application period has ended
Notes
Please see the university profile or contact us for the deadlines that apply to you