"Why Do We Always Have to Say We're Sorry?" A Case Study on Navigating Moral Expectations in Classroom Communication on National Socialism and the Holocaust in Germany

Against the background of the pedagogization and internationalization of Holocaust memory discourse, this contribution focuses on the specific conditions of history classes on National Socialism and the Holocaust in Germany. Using a case study, this article shows both how the meanings of these subjects are communicatively negotiated in history classes and how these classroom discourses relate to the specific context of the culture of memory in Germany. Particular attention is given to the question of guilt and the concomitant moral expectations—which can be interpreted as a specific condition of the memory of the Holocaust in the successor state of the Third Reich. Within this context, the central questions of my study are: (1) How do today's youth in Germany navigate the moral expectations that are implicit within the established historical narratives on the Holocaust? (2) How do ethnically and nationally linked conceptions of memory play a role in youth's sense-making about the Holocaust? (By the author)