30 | JANUARY 12 • 2023 

NEXTDOR
VOICE OF A NEW GENERATION
REMEMBRANCE 
CULTURE

BY YEVGENIYA GAZMAN

When Jakob Hoffmann, one of 
the Germany Close Up guides, 
used the term “remembrance 
culture” at our welcome and 
introduction meeting in Berlin, 
Germany, I thought, “How 
novel and insightful a term.” I 
did not realize how accurate, 
ingrained and common the 
term would be for The Well’s 
experience with Germany Close 
Up.
Germany Close Up was estab-
lished in 2007 and, since 2021, 
is administered by the German 
Academic Exchange Service 
(DAAD). Germany Close Up is 
an independent initiative fund-
ed by the German government. 
The goal of the program is to 
show the good and the bad of 
modern Germany. Program 
Director Kathleen Gransow 
said the program presents many 
perspectives and may confuse a 
little bit rather than give a single 
answer or viewpoint. 
Upon returning from 
Germany, I agonized over doing 
justice to the experience in 
writing and photographs that I 
planned to share with the com-
munity through this story for 
the Detroit Jewish News.
Twice since returning 
from Berlin, I visited the 
Zekelman Holocaust Center 
in Farmington Hills to gather 
my thoughts and get my facts 
straight. I was most concerned 
about accurately depicting the 
magnitude of Kristallnacht.
Of all the things we learned 
about on the trip, the most 
striking to me was the scale of 
destruction on Kristallnacht. 
In our program for the trip, 
the Wednesday, Nov. 9, eve-
ning activity was labeled 
“Commemoration Event of the 
Jewish Community of Berlin 
of the 84th Anniversary of the 

November Pogroms of 1938.” I 
had heard the term “pogrom” 
before but not in connection 
with Germany, but rather 
Russia. Pogrom is a Russian 
word.
One of our guides, Johanna 
Blender, explained that, essen-
tially, it is not politically correct 
to say Kristallnacht in Germany 
because it is a Nazi term and 
may have some antisemitic 
trope associated with Jews and 
wealth. So rather than referring 
to the night of Nov. 9, 1938, as 
Kristallnacht, it is referred to 
by Germans as the November 
Pogroms of 1938. Everyone 
on the trip recognized and felt 
comfortable using the term 
Kristallnacht. Needless to say, 
the horror of the event was not 
lost for us in the language.
Not only was our group in 
Berlin on the Gregarian anni-
versary of Kristallnacht, we 
were also there on the Hebrew 
calendar date anniversary — a 
rare overlap.
Prior to this trip, I did 
not understand how pivotal 
Kristallnacht was in the mobili-
zation of hate and carrying out 
of brutal violence against Jews. I 
did not grasp that Kristallnacht 
was not merely an insidious riot 
against Jews in a central loca-
tion, but rather in a single night 
on Nov. 9, 1938, “91 Jews were 
murdered, more than 1,400 
synagogues across Germany 
and Austria were torched, 
and Jewish-owned shops and 
businesses were plundered and 
destroyed. In addition, the Jews 
were forced to pay ‘compensa-
tion’ for the damage that had 
been caused and approximately 
30,000 Jews were arrested and 
sent to concentration camps.” 
(yadvashem.org) 
1,400 synagogues! Can you 
fathom this scale of destruc-
tion? In a single night!? 
On the day prior to the 
Kristallnacht anniversary, 

Yevgeniya 
Gazman

Gate to Jewish 
cemetery in 
Halberstadt

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