The wave (novel)

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The Wave ( English The Wave ) is a 1981 novel by Morton Rhue , which describes the events at a high school in a small American town. The German translation by Hans-Georg Noack was published in 1984 under the title Die Welle. Report of a teaching attempt that went too far.

content

Initial motives of the teacher

The starting point for the novel is a film about the Holocaust that history teacher Ben Ross is showing in his class as part of the Second World War class . In the class, as well as dismay, the film encounters on the one hand a lack of understanding of how such a regime could establish itself or how many Germans supposedly knew nothing about the Holocaust , and on the other hand the students' conviction that such a manipulation of the masses was not possible could repeat. Neither the teacher nor historical research can give precise answers to these questions.

“Something was bothering Ben Ross. He wasn't sure what it was, but the students' questions about the history class had something to do with it. Why hadn't he been able to give the boys and girls precise answers to their questions? Was the behavior of the majority really that inexplicable during the Nazi regime? […] Now, after reading for a few hours, Ben knew that he couldn't find the right answer anywhere in the books. He wondered if this was something the historians knew but could not explain in words. Was it only possible to understand it correctly on the spot? Or maybe by creating a similar situation. "

So the teacher decides to conduct an experiment: the wave.

“Maybe he should spend an hour or two on an experiment and give the students a sense of what it might have been like to live in Nazi Germany? If he succeeded in inventing an appropriate situation, he could really impress the students far more than anything that books could explain. "

The experiment aims to show how people can be manipulated using simple methods. "The Wave", an authoritarian community for which the history teacher is beginning to convince his class, is based on three principles established in consecutive lessons:

The three principles of the wave

The first level of power through discipline! consists only of the practice of discipline and a strict form of teaching that is fixed on the authoritarian behavior of the teacher, as was common in schools until the 1950s and early 1960s.

In the second lesson, power through community! the class is sworn to an unconditional, supra-individual sense of community and receives from the teacher the common, identity-forming symbol of the wave, including the corresponding greeting.

"It's the feeling of being part of a whole that is more important than yourself," said Mr. Ross. “You belong to a movement, a group, a belief. One is completely devoted to one thing ... "

In the third unit, power through action! he obliges the students to act as one group, to be equitable within the group and to recruit new members. Nevertheless, with the distribution of membership cards for ordinary members and managers who are obliged to report deviant behavior, a hierarchical structure and a monitoring system are created.

The wave has yet despite the established authoritarian and totalitarian structures no substantive principles, objectives or ideology as totalitarian systems and groups such as Nazism , Fascism , Stalinism are or religious sects to own.

Self-dynamic independence

In the course of the novel, these principles are internalized more and more by those involved . Ross notes that while his students can reproduce information - especially historical information - automatically, they stop thinking for themselves and questioning it critically. Within the elite group, on the one hand, the impression arises that everyone has equal rights, and previous outsiders like the student Robert can integrate and make a special profile.

On the other hand, the experiment threatens to destroy relationships between good friends, for example the relationship between Laurie, the critical editor-in-chief of the school newspaper, and her friend David, who is convinced of the positive aspects of the wave, as he transfers them to the team spirit of his sports team. Both David and Amy, Laurie's best friend, consider Laurie's concerns to be the result of jealousy, as their previous popularity declines as the wave rises. Gradually, the experiment shows totalitarian traits, since membership in the wave, which has long since spread across the history class, is increasingly becoming an unquestioned compulsion at school.

End the experiment

Only after a Jewish student experiences violence because, on the one hand, he is in a sporting competition with a classmate and, on the other hand, has not joined the wave, does Ross understand the dangerousness of his actions. After an intensive conversation with his wife, he realizes that he has to stop the experiment. It worked too well. In order to let the learning effect of the experiment take effect on the students, he asks the director the next morning for a delay until the afternoon. He agrees, but also makes it clear to Ross that he would lose his job if he failed. Ross also asks Laurie and David, who are now making up again, to trust until the afternoon.

The history teacher uses a general assembly called for members of the wave to show the movement its reality and originally thought to be impossible fascist style. Instead of the expected speech by the (non-existent) "Führer" of the wave, he shows a picture of Adolf Hitler and accuses the students: "Yes, yes, you would all have been good Nazis."

All students are dismayed and want to quickly forget the community of the wave , but take into account the insights gained for the future. The breakup hits the biggest winner of the wave , Robert, who for the first time has not been an outsider beyond the community. He is completely desperate, so he still has many conversations with his teacher Ben Ross.

background

The novel is based on the screenplay for the film " The Wave " from 1981, which in turn is based on the experiment " The Third Wave " carried out in 1967 at a high school in Palo Alto by the history teacher Ron Jones . In 1972, Ron Jones published a short article entitled "The Third Wave". Years later, Ron Jones summarized his experiences in the book "No Substitute for Madness: A Teacher, His Kids, and the Lessons of Real Life". In 2008 another film adaptation was shown under the name " Die Welle ", which is set in what is now Germany. However, the film differs from the original book not only in the location, but also in the ending.

expenditure

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Morton Rhue: Die Welle , translated by Hans-Georg Noack, Otto Maier Verlag, Ravensburg, 1987, pp. 13-18
  2. ^ Morton Rhue: Die Welle , translated by Hans-Georg Noack, Otto Maier Verlag, Ravensburg, 1987, p. 29
  3. ^ Morton Rhue: Die Welle , translated by Hans-Georg Noack, Otto Maier Verlag, Ravensburg, 1987, p. 29 u. 30th
  4. ^ A b Morton Rhue: Die Welle , translated by Hans-Georg Noack, Otto Maier Verlag, Ravensburg, 1987, pp. 33-40
  5. ^ Morton Rhue: Die Welle , translated by Hans-Georg Noack, Otto Maier Verlag, Ravensburg, 1987, p. 45
  6. ^ Morton Rhue: Die Welle , translated by Hans-Georg Noack, Otto Maier Verlag, Ravensburg, 1987, pp. 44–47
  7. ^ Morton Rhue: Die Welle , translated by Hans-Georg Noack, Ravensburger Buchverlag, 1997, pp. 118 and 134
  8. ^ Morton Rhue: Die Welle , translated by Hans-Georg Noack, Ravensburger Buchverlag, 1997, pp. 115–116
  9. ^ Morton Rhue: Die Welle , translated by Hans-Georg Noack, Ravensburger Buchverlag, 1997, pp. 152–162
  10. ^ Morton Rhue: Die Welle , translated by Hans-Georg Noack, Ravensburger Buchverlag, 1997, p. 179

Secondary literature

Web links