Germania Judaica

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The Germania Judaica, Cologne library on the history of German Jewry , was founded in 1959, among others by Heinrich Böll . It is set up as a registered association and is administered by the Central Library of the City of Cologne.

With a holdings of approx. 85,000 volumes, it is the largest specialist scientific library on the history and culture of German-speaking Jewry in Europe.

This institution is to be distinguished from the research project Germania Judaica , which since 1903 has been compiling an "alphabetical directory of all localities in the German Empire where Jewish settlements existed from the earliest times up to the Vienna Treaties" and whose scientific description is based on the sources for Has set a goal (cf. Germania Judaica I, p. IX).

history

In 1959, a citizens' initiative came together in Cologne , which founded the association and at the same time the Germania Judaica library in order to found an effective instrument against the still prevailing anti-Semitism in Germany . The writers Heinrich Böll and Paul Schallück , the journalist Wilhelm Unger , the publisher Ernst Brücher, the cultural department of the city of Cologne, Kurt Hackenberg , and the bookseller Karl Keller were convinced that the public was very inadequate about the history and culture of German-speaking Jewry be informed and that ignorance fosters prejudice.

development

Due to the public recognition, the Germania Judaica received institutional funding from the city of Cologne and the state of North Rhine-Westphalia from the 1970s onwards . The library continues to be supported by the contributions of its members and by private donations. Since the state of North Rhine-Westphalia withdrew from supporting the library in 2005, Germania Judaica has been funded exclusively by the city of Cologne since the beginning of 2006. However, the city expects the library to use sources other than city sources to finance its book budget. Since 1979 it has been located on the 3rd floor of the Cologne City Library , in the central library on Neumarkt.

From 1993 until her death in 2017, the Judaist Annette Haller was the head of the library. Ursula Reuter, who has a doctorate in history, has been managing director of Germania Judaica since April 2018.

Collecting areas

As a specialized scientific library, the Germania Judaica serves both Cologne readers and researchers from all over Germany and abroad. The Germania Judaica primarily collects literature on the history of Jews in Germany since the early modern period . The focus of the collection is on local and regional history . The most important other collecting areas are:

  • History of German-speaking Jewry from the early modern period ( protective Jewry , emancipation , community history, organization, biographies, Jews under National Socialism , concentration camps , emigration , history of exile, Jews after 1945)
  • General Jewish history and culture (religion, art, education, sociology, Jews in non-German language areas)
  • Zionism and Palestine / Israel ( Zionism , Palestine , founding of the state, Middle East conflict , immigration, forms of settlement, culture, travelogues)
  • Anti-Semitism (sources of modern anti-Semitism, racism , theories of anti-Semitism, countermeasures, neo-Nazism )
  • Representation of Jews in literature and film (novels, dramas, youth and children's books, secondary literature)
  • German-Jewish periodicals (over 500 different Jewish newspapers and magazines; current newspapers and magazines)

Research survey

Every three years the Germania Judaica publishes a survey on ongoing research on the history of German Jewry and anti-Semitism in its “Arbeitsinformationen”.

Compact memory

Germania Judaica was involved in the DFG project "Jewish Periodicals in German-Speaking Countries". In the specialist portal Compact Memory (www.compactmemory.de) the most important German-Jewish newspapers and magazines up to 1938 are made available online free of charge.

literature

  • Alwin Müller-Jerina: Germania Judaica: The development and importance of a scientific special library. Cologne 1986.
  • Germania Judaica, inventory catalog I, regional and local history. Cologne 1988.
  • Germania Judaica, inventory catalog II, regional and local history. Cologne 1999.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Homepage Central Council of Jews in Germany
  2. ^ Steinheim Institute biography Ursula Reuter , accessed on June 15, 2019

Coordinates: 50 ° 56 ′ 3.1 ″  N , 6 ° 56 ′ 57.5 ″  E