Christopher Browning, one of the world’s most distinguished historians of the Holocaust, will speak Wednesday, April 22, at 7 p.m. in Jonasson Hall, lower level of Melrose Hall, at Linfield College.
Browning, the Frank Porter Graham Professor of History emeritus at the University of North Carolina, will present “Holocaust History and Survivor Testimony: The Case of the Starachowice Factory Slave Labor Camps.” His research focuses on Nazi Germany and the Holocaust. He has written extensively about three issues: first, Nazi decision- and policy-making in regard to the origins of the Final Solution; second, the behavior and motives of various middle- and lower-echelon personnel involved in implementing Nazi Jewish policy; and third, the use of survivor testimony to explore Jewish responses and survival strategies.
Among his many influential publications are “Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland,” “The Origins of the Final Solution: The Evolution of Nazi Jewish Policy, September 1939-March 1942,” “Nazi Policy, Jewish Workers, German Killers” and “Remembering Survival: Inside a Nazi Slave-Labor Camp.”
Browning holds a master’s and Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The lecture is free and open to the public. It is sponsored by the Jonas A. “Steine” Jonasson Endowed Lecture that honors Jonasson, professor emeritus of history, who was associated with Linfield for more than 60 years before his death in 1997. The endowment is used to bring in distinguished scholars and speakers in the area of history. Jonasson held the unofficial title of Linfield historian and wrote “Bricks Without Straw,” a history of the college. For more information, contact Scott Smith, 503-883-2281 or scsmith@linfield.edu.
