Alexander Zinn (historian)

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Alexander Zinn (* 1968 in Berlin ) is a German sociologist and historian who conducts research in particular on socio-historical issues of discrimination and persecution based on sexual orientation.

Life

Alexander Zinn studied sociology , psychology , journalism and ethnology at the Free University of Berlin . The focus of the studies was on historical issues such as the development of sociology in the “Third Reich”. In 1995 he completed his studies with Hans Joas with a diploma thesis on the "Social Construction of the Homosexual National Socialists", which dealt with the image of homosexuals in the propaganda of the anti-fascist exile press. Tin doctorate at the Max Weber Center of the University of Erfurt in the subject history . Supervised by Dieter Gosewinkel from the Berlin Science Center for Social Research and Rüdiger Lautmann from the University of Bremen , the dissertation “Removed from the people” was created? Everyday life and persecution of homosexual men in the “Third Reich” .

Up to now, Zinn has worked as a journalist, press officer and scientist. As a freelance journalist, he worked for Deutschlandradio and the Berliner Zeitung, among others . For Egmont Ehapa Media , RTL New Media, the Lesbian and Gay Association in Germany and Edition Salzgeber , he carried out various press and public relations functions. Since April 2018 he has been employed as a research assistant at the Hannah Arendt Institute for Research on Totalitarianism .

His academic work focuses on socio-historical questions of discrimination and persecution based on sexual orientation as well as everyday life and stigma management of homosexuals in the 20th century. A particular focus is the persecution of homosexuals during the Nazi era and in the GDR. Zinn is the author of various publications on the "Third Reich" and on the causes and prevention of homophobia. In 2011 he published a biography of the Buchenwald survivor Rudolf Brazda under the title “Happiness always came to me” , which had a broad journalistic response.

In an article published in the Zeitschrift für Geschichtswwissenschaft , Zinn speaks out against reducing complex historical events to a banal perpetrator-victim dichotomy. He understands stigmatization and stigma management as complex, interrelated socio-psychological processes that cannot be adequately described with perpetrator-victim categories. In previous research on homosexual persecution, he criticizes an excessive focus on victim biographies, which tends to ignore the historical context as well as "undesirable" biographical aspects. It is easy to lose sight of the fact that homosexuals were often very idiosyncratic actors who, despite adverse circumstances, more or less “successfully” designed their biographies.

Zinn has been a member of the International Advisory Board of the Brandenburg Memorials Foundation since 2008 . He is the founder of the Initiative Holbein Foundation, which wants to realize the legacy of the lawyer Hans Holbein . In addition, he runs the website www.rosa-winkel.de, which provides information about the Nazi persecution of homosexuals.

Alexander Zinn is a son of the writer Dorit Zinn , who processed his coming out in the literary non-fiction book "My son loves men".

Works

Monographs
  • "Removed from the national body"? Homosexual Men under National Socialism, Frankfurt / New York 2018.
  • “Happiness always came to me”. Rudolf Brazda - The Survival of a Homosexual in the Third Reich, Frankfurt / New York 2011.
  • The social construction of the homosexual National Socialist. On the genesis and establishment of a stereotype, Frankfurt / New York 1997.
Editorships
  • Homosexuals in Germany 1933–1969. Articles on everyday life, stigmatization and persecution, reports and studies by the Hannah Arendt Institute, Volume 84, Göttingen 2020.
Articles in magazines
  • Farewell to the victim's perspective. Plea for a paradigm shift in gay and lesbian historiography. In: Zeitschrift für Geschichtswwissenschaft, 67 (2019) 11, pp. 934–955.
  • Hated or exploited? Sociology in the Third Reich from the perspective of the Reich Ministry of Science. In: Zeitschrift für Soziologie, 21 (1992) 5, pp. 347–365.
Articles in edited volumes
  • Against the 'over-identification' with the victims. Polemic for a paradigm shift in gay and lesbian historiography. In: Invertito. Yearbook for the History of Homosexualities, Volume 21, Hamburg 2019, pp. 124–161.
  • “They are enemies of the state”. Persecution of homosexuals under the Nazi regime. In: Georg Teichert (ed.): L (i) just in secret. Homosexuality between Stonewall and Marriage for All. Leipzig, 2019, pp. 37–56.
  • SA, homosexuality and fascism. On the genesis of the stereotype of the gay Nazi. In: Yves Müller / Reiner Zilkenat (ed.), Civil War Army. Research on the National Socialist Sturmabteilung (SA), Peter Lang, Frankfurt / New York 2013, pp. 393–413.
  • Homophobia and male homosexuality in concentration camps. On the situation of men with the pink triangle. In: Insa Eschebach (ed.), Homophobie und Devianz. Female and Male Homosexuality in National Socialism, Metropol, Berlin 2012, pp. 79–96.
  • Lesbians and gays - victims of assault in different ways (together with Stefanie Soine). In: Wilhelm Heitmeyer / Monika Schröttle (eds.), Violence - descriptions, analyzes, prevention, Federal Center for Civic Education, Bonn 2006, pp. 344–364.
  • Scenarios of homophobia. Apologists and executors. In: Wilhelm Heitmeyer (ed.), German conditions. Episode 3, Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt a. M. 2005, pp. 207-219.
  • Clash of Cultures? About the relationship of young people of Turkish and Arab origin to homosexuality and homosexuals. In: LSVD Berlin-Brandenburg eV (ed.), Muslims under the rainbow. Homosexuality, Migration and Islam, Querverlag, Berlin 2004, pp. 226–259.
  • The Third Reich of the Homosexuals. In: Elmar Kraushaar (ed.), Hundred Years of Gay. Eine Revue, Rowohlt Berlin, Berlin 1997, pp. 22–45.
  • "The Homosexual Movement". In: Detlef Grumbach, Die Linke und das Laster, MännerschwarmSkript, Hamburg 1995, pp. 38–84.
Reviews
  • Review of: Manfred Herzer, Magnus Hirschfeld and his time, Berlin 2017. In: H-Soz-Kult from May 28, 2020 .
  • Review of: "Sounds of Silence". A detective music film by Klaus Stanjek. In: Invertito. Yearbook for the History of Homosexualities, 18th year, 2017, pp. 182–185.
Press articles (selection)
  • Research on homosexuality? The Hans Holbein Foundation and the University of Jena. In: Gerbergasse. Thuringian quarterly for contemporary history and politics. 25 (2020) 95, pp. 36-39.
  • “They are enemies of the state”. A contribution about the persecution of homosexuals under National Socialism. Published on June 25, 2019 at www.zeitgeschichte-online.de
  • Radio interview, Homosexuals under National Socialism, Radio 1, July 28, 2018
  • "An honest person". In: kreuzer - Das Leipzig Magazin, July 2018, pp. 30–31
  • Radio interview, HAIT research project on homosexual persecution, MDR, April 2018
  • “They burdened each other,” Alexander Zinn on homosexuality in the Third Reich. In: Potsdamer Latest News from April 20, 2013, p. 2
  • Rudolf Brazda. “Happiness always came to me”. In: Frankfurter Rundschau of June 27, 2008

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Der Spiegel from 4 July 2011 Die Welt from 14 January 2012 Frankfurter Rundschau from 6 April 2011 Die Zeit from 23 May 2013
  2. ↑ Alexander Zinn: Farewell to the victim's perspective. Plea for a paradigm shift in gay and lesbian historiography. In: Zeitschrift für Geschichtswwissenschaft, 67 (2019) 11, pp. 934–955.
personal data
SURNAME Tin, Alexander
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German sociologist and historian
DATE OF BIRTH 1968
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin