Enter your search term...

German/European & Jewish History

Modern German history and the history of German-speaking Jewry have been core research fields at the GHI since the institute’s founding in 1987. German migrations to North America, relations between Germany and the United States, and the flight of German Jews from Nazi Germany have been major research topics since the GHI’s early years. More recently, the GHI has given increased attention to the transnational and global dimensions of German, Central European, and Jewish history.

Photo Credit: E. Zimmermann, Satirical Map of Europe, ca. 1914, Library of Congress.

Team

Isabel Richter

Deputy Director

Isabel Richter

Deputy Director
Pacific Office of the German Historical Institute Washington
Institute of European Studies | University of California, Berkeley | 249 Philosophy Hall | Berkeley, CA 94720-2316
Phone +1.202.552.8936

richter@ghi-dc.orgRead on

Projects

German Heritage in Letters

German Heritage in Letters is a project to create a digital collection of German-language correspondence currently held in private hands, by archives, by special collection libraries, museums, and other institutions.

German History in Documents and Images (GHDI)

GHDI is a comprehensive collection of primary source materials documenting Germany's political, social, and cultural history from 1500 to the present.

German History Intersections

The German History Intersections project is a transatlantic initiative that will begin by examining three broad themes – German identity; migration; and knowledge and education – over as many as five centuries.

Innovation through Tradition? Jewish Educational Media and Cultural Transformation in the Face of Modernity Religion, Knowledge, and Education as Key Elements of Socio-Cultural Transformation

German-Israeli cooperative research project bringing that investigates the transformation of Jewish daily life through the prism of its central spaces of teaching, learning and knowledge.

Migrant Melodies: Jewish Refugee Songs as a Transnational Archive of Emotions

Viola Alianov-Rautenberg

"Remnants Saved from the Fire": A Transnational History of Jewish Ceremonial Objects after 1945

Anna-Carolin Augustin

In Pursuit of Knowing: Nineteenth-Century Jewish Education and the Transformation of Jewish Knowledge

Kerstin von der Krone

Family and Enterprise in the Age of Industry: The Arnholds, 1808-2000

Simone Lässig

Coping with Disruptive Change: Jews, Middle Class Culture, and Social Transformation in Germany, 1800-1860

Simone Lässig

West German Youth and Countercultures in the Global 1960s

Isabel Richter

The Politics of Punishment: Penal Reform in Modern Germany, 1870-1970

Richard F. Wetzell

Racial Science and Nazi Biopolitics

Richard F. Wetzell

Events & Conferences

May 18, 2025

The Place of the Holocaust in German-Jewish History and Memory

Eighth Junior Scholars Conference in Jewish History in Berlin | Organized by Anna-Carolin Augustin (German Historical Institute Washington), Mark Roseman (Indiana University Bloomington), and Miriam Rürup (Moses Mendelssohn Centre for European-Jewish Studies, Potsdam), and the Wissenschaftliche Arbeitsgemeinschaft des Leo Baeck Instituts with additional support from the Indiana University Europe Gateway in Berlin

Read on

May 21, 2025

Research Seminar

Joshua Teplitsky (University of Pennsylvania)

Read on

May 27, 2025

Resilience and Resistance in Fragile Democracies: Historical Perspectives from Germany, Hungary, and Poland

Panel Discussion at GHI Washington | Speakers: Michael Brenner (American University), Christina Morina (Univ. Bielefeld/ New School), Robert Nemes (Colgate College), Karolina Wigura (Univ. Warsaw); Moderator: Ken Pomeranz (Univ. Chicago) and Eric Langenbacher (American-German Institute)

Read on

Jun 03, 2025

30th Transatlantic Doctoral Seminar: German History in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries

Seminar at GHI Washington | Conveners: Anna von der Goltz (Georgetown University) and Richard Wetzell (GHI Washington)

Read on

Jun 06, 2025

Sixteenth Workshop on Early Modern German History

Workshop at the GHI London | Conveners: Bridget Heal (University of St. Andrews), David Lederer (NUI Maynooth), Alison Rowlands (University of Essex) and Mirjam Haehnle (GHI London)

Read on

Jun 12, 2025

From the Margins: Poverty in Divided and United Germany

Lecture at GHI Washington | Speaker: Christoph Lorke (LWL-Institut für westfälische Regionalgeschichte)

Read on

Jun 25, 2025

Germans in the Asia-Pacific Region: (Post) Colonial Entanglements, Conflicts and Perceptions in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries

Conference in Flinders University (city campus), Adelaide, South Australia | Conveners: Matthew Fitzpatrick (Flinders University), Simone Lässig (GHI Washington), Isabel Richter (GHI Washington Pacific Office at UC Berkeley)

Read on

Sep 10, 2025

Universities and the Public Good: Research, Education, and Democracy since 1945

Workshop and Young Scholars Forum at Herrenhausen Palace, Hanover, Germany | Conveners: Charles Dorn (Bowdoin College, Maine), Axel Jansen (German Historical Institute Washington), Charlotte Lerg (Amerika-Institut, LMU München), Till van Rahden (Centre canadien d’études allemandes et européennes, Université de Montréal), and Richard F. Wetzell (German Historical Institute Washington)

Read on

Sep 25, 2025

Beyond Refuge: Legacies of Forced Migration and Transit in Post-1945 History

Roundtable at the 49th annual conference of the German Studies Association, Arlington, VA | Conveners: Swen Steinberg (Queen's University) and Rebekka Grossmann (Leiden University)

Read on

Sep 29, 2025

Food, Migration, and Belonging in 20th Century European History

Conference at German Historical Institute | Pacific Office at UC Berkeley | Conveners: Maren Möhring (University of Leipzig), Isabel Richter (GHI Washington Pacific Office at UC Berkeley)

Read on

Oct 09, 2025

The Campus and Beyond: Higher Education and Social Inequalities in Europe and North America, 1850s-2000s

International Conference at the German Historical Institute Washington | Conveners: Raphael Rössel (GHI Washington), Elizabeth Tandy Shermer (Loyola University Chicago), and Stefanie Coché (Gießen University)

Read on

Apr 23, 2026

Rebuild or Retreat? Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Climate Migration and Mobility in the Global North

Conference at GHI Washington | Conveners: Jana Dunz-Keck (GHI Washington) and Sarah Beringer (GHI Washington), Simon Richter (University of Pennsylvania), Andreas Hübner (Kiel University), Max Gruenig (POCACITO Network and Georgetown University, BMW Center for German and European Studies), and Brendan O’Donnell (POCACITO Network and Heinrich Böll Foundation)

Read on
all events

Publications

Christina Brauner, Renate Dürr, Philip Hahn, Anne Sophie Overkamp, Simon Siemianowski, eds.

Encountering the Global in Early Modern Germany: Microhistories of Mobility, Materiality, and Belonging

Studies in German History. Vol. 30. New York: Berghahn Books, 2025.

Read on

Bulletin 74 (Fall 2024)

Forum: European and Global Perspectives on Social Democracy and State Violence

Read on

Michelle Lynn Kahn

Foreign in Two Homelands: Racism, Return Migration, and Turkish-German History

Publications of the German Historical Institute. Cambridge University Press, 2024.

Read on

Bulletin 73 (Spring 2024)

Forum: Antisemitism and Sexualities

Read on

Maximilian Klose

Why They Gave: CARE and American Aid for Germany after 1945

Transatlantische Historische Studien. Band 63. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2024.

Read on

Jan C. Jansen & Kirsten McKenzie, eds.

Mobility and Coercion in an Age of Wars and Revolutions

Publications of the German Historical Institute. Cambridge University Press, 2024.

Read on

Michael Weaver

Political Friendship: Liberal Notables, Networks, and the Pursuit of the German Nation State, 1848-1866

Studies in German History. Vol. 29. New York: Berghahn Books, 2024.

Read on

Bulletin 72 (Fall 2023)

Forum: The German Treatment of Soviet Prisoners of War During The Second World War

Read on
all publications

Latest News

Call for Papers

The Moralization of Science

Deadline: September 15, 2025 | Conference at the German Historical Institute Washington | September 17 – 18, 2026

Read on
Prize

2025 Franz Steiner Prize awarded to Nadine Klopfer

On May 10, 2025, GHI Washington Deputy Director Axel Jansen together with Johannes Klemm of the Steiner Verlag awarded the biennial Franz Steiner…

Read on
Opportunities

Intern at the German Historical Institute

Deadline: July 31, 2025 | The GHI Internship Program gives students of history, political science, public relations, and public administration at…

Read on
Call for Papers

Rebuild or Retreat? Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Climate Migration and Mobility in the Global North

Deadline: June 16, 2025 | Conference at the German Historical Institute Washington | April 23 – 24, 2026

Read on
Call for Papers

Imperial Legacies? (Dis)continuities and Comparisons between Colonialism and Nazi Rule

Deadline: July 1, 2025 | International Conference at the German Historical Institute Washington | May 28 – 29, 2026

Read on