Das Warenhaus als Erzieher. Modernisierung und Modernisierungskritik um 1900 [The department store as educator. Modernization and criticism of modernization around 1900]

(Thomas  Lenz)

The department stores of the German Empire were symbolic spaces of the modern age in which people discovered new merchandise, had new experiences, and had new hopes awakened. The «shrines to consumerism» of the early twentieth century staged products and arranged articles in a way that was designed to create the sales-promoting illusion of a new and better (consumption) reality. In this way, department stores became places where modern consumption and the modern world were on display and could be experienced: They educated store visitors in modernity. But at the same time, they were also focal points of a morally-charged debate containing antisemitic and misogynist stereotypes; in the debate German cultural pessimism is revealed, as this contribution demonstrates.

Teaching a Troubled Past. Potential Challenges and Pitfalls of Incorporating Family Recollections into History Education.

(Sabine Moller)

Having to compete with the memories of contemporary witnesses is the great problem for scientific contemporary history. The difficulties increase if these memories are handed down within the family, because the succeeding generations tend to gloss over the memory knowledge, as the following contribution shows, taking the example of National Socialism. Through this, a very specific task area arises for history instruction.