Bernhard Strebel (historian)

Bernhard Strebel (* 1962 ) is a German historian and non-fiction author with a focus on coming to terms with the time of National Socialism .

Life

Bernhard Strebel studied history and literature at the Leibniz University of Hanover . Since the beginning of the 1990s he has been doing research on the Ravensbrück concentration camp in particular and received his doctorate in 2001 from the University of Hanover with an overall presentation of the history of this women's concentration camp . His dissertation was revised by him, together with a foreword by the French ethnologist and resistance fighter Germaine Tillion , in 2003 under the title The Ravensbrück concentration camp. History of a warehouse complex published by Schöningh-Verlag in Paderborn and awarded the “Prix Guillaume Fichet - Octave Simon” in Paris in October 2003. A French translation has been published by Fayard in Paris since 2005, and a Polish translation of the book has appeared since the end of last year.

Strebel's main focus as a historian is the history of National Socialism , especially concentration camps , forced labor , the war economy and the persecution of Jews . He has published several non-fiction books on this topic so far; u. a. In 2002 he published the autobiography of the Holocaust survivor Ruth Herskovits-Gutmann , which he translated from English and commented on , whose family was friends with that of the Hanoverian rabbi Lesser Knoller . On behalf of the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science, Strebel published together with Jens-Christian Wagner (co-author) and Carola Sachse (editor) in 2003 an “overview” of forced labor for research institutions of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society at that time of the Second World War . His research results on the Celle massacre of April 1945 were published in 2013 in the series Celler Contributions to the Regional and Cultural History of the City Archives of Celle and the Celle Bomann Museum .

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Strebel worked as a research assistant at the Bergen-Belsen Memorial .

In a two-year work until 2010, Strebel prepared an expert report on the street names in Celle and personal connections with National Socialism on behalf of the city council of Celle , which attracted public attention and led to a controversial discussion. Criticism was u. a. practiced on Strebel's work on the Nazi entanglements of the former mayor of Celle, Helmuth Hörstmann . The Celle lawyer Peter Weise, who describes himself as a “hobby historian”, accused Strebel of “wrong conclusions” and “unscientificness” - and finally had to put up with this accusation himself publicly. Wise accusations were rejected as "unfounded" by Hans-Ulrich Thamer , member of the evaluation committee for the street names in Celle and lecturer for modern and contemporary history at the Wilhelms-Universität Münster ; Both Strebel's approach and his report are technically correct. The accusation of unscientificness, according to Thamer, is a "popular method of hanging something unpopular down". As a result, there was a controversial argument in local politics and the public about how to deal with Strebel's reports and the renaming of streets.

Bernhard Strebel lives and works in Hanover .

Publications

Authorship

• Bernhard Strebel: The " Rosa Winkel prisoners " in the men's camp of the Ravensbrück concentration camp , in: Herbert Diercks (Red.): Persecution of homosexuals under National Socialism (= contributions to the history of National Socialist persecution in Northern Germany , volume 5), publisher: KZ - Neuengamme Memorial, Bremen: Edition Temmen, 1999, ISBN 3-86108-738-3 , pp. 34–41; contents
• The Ravensbrück concentration camp. History of a camp complex. With a foreword by Germaine Tillion . Schöningh, Paderborn u. a. 2003, ISBN 3-506-70123-1 (also dissertation under the title Der Lagerkomplex des KZ Ravensbrück , Uni Hannover 2001; review by H-Soz-Kult ).
  • in French translation by Odile Demange: Ravensbrück. Un complexe concentrationnaire (=  Pour une histoire du XXe siècle ). With a foreword by Germaine Tillion. Fayard, Paris 2005, ISBN 2-213-62423-2 .
• together with Jens-Christian Wagner : Forced labor for research institutions of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society 1939–1945. An overview (=  results. Preprints from the research program "History of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism" , No. 11). Published by Carola Sachse on behalf of the Presidential Commission of the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science e. V. (MPG). Research program "History of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism", Berlin 2003 ( online public domain; PDF, 620 kB).
• Celle April 1945 revisited . An American bomb attack, German massacre of concentration camp prisoners and a British court case (=  Celle contributions to national and cultural history. Series of publications by the City Archives and the Bomann Museum in Celle , Volume 38). 2nd Edition. Published by the city of Celle . Publishing house for regional history, Bielefeld 2013, ISBN 978-3-89534-938-6 .
• “It doesn't matter what the street you live in is called.” Street names in Celle and personal connections with National Socialism. Revised and amended version. On behalf of the city of Celle. Hannover 2010 (Opinion, online public domain; PDF, 758 kB).

Editing

• Ruth Herskovits-Gutmann: Emigration not possible for the time being. The story of the Herskovits family from Hanover. Edited, translated (from English) and commented by Bernhard Strebel. Wallstein-Verlag, Göttingen 2002, ISBN 3-89244-507-9 ( excerpts from Google Books ).

Web links

• Literature by and about Bernhard Strebel in the catalog of the German National Library

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} See short biography of Bernhard Strebel . In: The same, together with Jens-Christian Wagner : Forced labor for research institutions of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society 1939–1945. An overview (=  results. Preprints from the research program "History of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism" , No. 11). Published by Carola Sachse on behalf of the Presidential Commission of the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science e. V. (MPG). Research program "History of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society under National Socialism", Berlin 2003, p 85 ( online public domain; PDF, 620 kB).
2. ↑ - French Prize for German Historians. Retrieved on May 8, 2019 (German). 
3. ^ Johannes Schwartz: B. Strebel: The Ravensbrück concentration camp . Review by H-Soz-Kult on January 24, 2005; accessed on January 1, 2016.
4. ↑ Ruth Gutmann: A Final Reckoning. A Hannover Family's Life and Death in the Shoah . New edition. The University of Alabama Press, Tuscaloosa (Alabama / USA) 2013, ISBN 978-0-8173-1809-3 , p. 8 u. 49 (English; excerpts from Google Books ).
5. ↑ Gunther Meinrenken: Accusation of unscientificness: "Criticism of Strebel-Gutachten baseless." In: Cellesche Zeitung of December 3, 2010 ( online ( Memento of the original of December 30, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and still not checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this note. , accessed on January 1, 2016). 
6. ↑ Gabriele Schulte: Controversy. When it comes to street names, Celle wrestles with Nazi giants. In: Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung of December 8, 2010 ( online , accessed January 1, 2016).