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Paul A. Levine

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Paul A. Levine (31.12.1956 – 28.10.2019) was an American-Swedish Holocaust & Genocide Historian

Biography

Paul A. Levine, who was born in New York and raised in Covina CA, was an American-Swedish Holocaust and Genocide Historian, an associate professor and Docent of Holocaust and modern European political history. He was a Co-founder of Uppsala University’s Hugo Valentin Centre for Holocaust & Genocide Studies,[1] and the author of many publications on Holocaust history and memory. After receiving his doctorate in 1996 with the monograph From Indifference to Activism; Swedish Diplomacy and the Holocaust, 1938- 1944,[2]. Levine pursued his work in Uppsala, Sweden. His main preoccupation was writing and teaching about the Holocaust. Working on his book, Raoul Wallenberg and Swedish diplomacy in Budapest in 1944-1945, Levine helped to understand Raoul Wallenberg in his real context, destroying existing myths about the Swedish hero.[3] Tell Ye Your Children, by Stéphane Bruchfeld and Paul A. Levine, remains the second most printed book in Sweden after The Bible. The authors were able to distill large historical, historiographical, biographical, and graphic elements into a format and language which has appealed to both diplomats and middle-school students. The book has been used in university courses, in public and private school classrooms, for adult education, and by union-organizations. First published in 1998 by the Swedish government, the book was commissioned as part of a national educational campaign to educate Swedish citizens about the Holocaust. The esteemed Holocaust historian Prof. Yehuda Bauer called it “The best book on the Holocaust for its length and goals”. Most significantly, that book led directly to the formation, in 1999, of what was initially the International Task Force on Holocaust Research, Remembrance and Education. That unprecedented international diplomatic body evolved into the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). Today, that international diplomatic and educational body consists of 31 member countries, two liaison,s and eight observer countries.[4] His life in Europe where he examined and researched, over several decades, European bureaucratic indifference and activism in WW2. After a long career as an associate professor of Holocaust History and Genocide Studies, he lived the final six years of his life in Berlin, his favorite city, working as a freelance historian. Professor Levine always said that he wants to die and be buried in Berlin, the city most close to his heart and to his research; “The Belle & The Beast”, as he called it, with love and sympathy.

At the time of his death, Levine was working on a memoir and teacher’s guide, hoping to instruct educators how to think and teach about the Holocaust and about genocide in a progressive and humanistic manner. His work also made a significant contribution to the study and explanation of the Armenian Genocide.

Publications

As single author

• Raoul Wallenberg in Budapest; Myth, History & Holocaust (Vallentine Mitchell, London, UK & Portland,USA, 2010. • From Indifference to Activism; Swedish Diplomacy and the Holocaust, 1938- 1944, (Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, Studia Historica Upsaliensia), 1996. [In Sweden, doctoral dissertations are published. [Quite unusually, my study was re-published in 1998 with an afterword added]

Co-author

• Bruchfeld, Stéphane, and Levine, Paul A., Om detta må ni berätta; en bok om Förintelsen i Europa 1933- 1945. 5th and revised edition, med ett nytt kapital om Sverige och Förintelsen, 2009.

More of Levine’s publications

Series: THE HUGO VALENTIN LECTURES, No.: 6 (VIII-IX), Series Editor: Paul A. Levine, Number of pages: 49 pp., Format: 130x205 mm, softback, Published: May 2013, ISSN 1651-6265, ISBN 978-91-86531-09-6.

Prizes and stipends received

• The Raoul Wallenberg Centennial Medal 2012, Awarded in Buenos Aires for my book—“Raoul Wallenberg in Budapest; Myth, History & Holocaust” (2010), by the Raoul Wallenberg International Foundation; Buenos Aires, November 2012. This prize was supported by the Swedish Embassy, Bueno Aires. • The Martin H:son Holmdahl Award, with Stéphane Bruchfeld, for service to Uppsala University and to Holocaust education and research in Sweden. Jan 2010. • Föreningen Förintelsens Överlevande i Sverige”, Års pris. (The Holocaust Survivors Organization of Sweden’s ”Annual Prize” for contributions to Holocaust Education”. January 2010. • Erasmus Teaching Exchange Stipend; Teaching, Course in Genocide Studies, with seminars & advising students during a two-week exchange. Charles University, Institute of Political Science, March 2013. • Erasmus Teaching Exchange Stipend; Teaching, Teaching of Holocaust History, conducting seminars & advising students during a two-week exchange. Magnus Vytutas University & Vilnius Yiddish Institute, Kaunas & Vilnius, Lithuania, Sept. 2010. • Book of the Year Award, Ord och Bild academi, for “Tell Ye Your Children…”, Stockholm, 1999. • Erzählt es euren Kindern; Der Holocaust in Europa, Short Listed for, “Deutschen Jugendliteraturpreis, Arbeitskreis für Jugendliteratur e. V. (sachbuch), Frankfurt Book Fair, 2001.

Recordings with Paul A. Levine

See also

References

  1. ^ Uppsala University’s Hugo Valentin Centre, Uppsala historian Paul A. Levine awarded Raoul Wallenberg Foundation Medal, https://www.uu.se/en/news/news-document/?id=2067&typ&fbclid=IwAR1A8lKbq4k5wMKnr2_5hMmwKJTw570tYziVrf8CTV7thEd2ieUQX_Okook
  2. ^ Levine, P. A., From Indifference to Activism: Swedish Diplomacy and the Holocaust, 1938-1944, 1998.
  3. ^ Levine, Paul A., 2019, Written as proposal to one of Levine’s projects on the Armenian Genocide; Archive Levine Library.
  4. ^ Levine, Paul A., 2019, Written as proposal to one of Levine’s projects on the Armenian Genocide; Archive Levine Library.

Further reading

  • Levine, P. A., From indifference to activism: Swedish diplomacy and the Holocaust, 1938-1944, 1998.
  • Bystanders to the Holocaust; A Re-Evaluation, (Frank Cass, London), 2002. Levine, Paul A., introduction and conclusion.
  • Bystanders to the Holocaust; A Re-Evaluation, special edition of the Journal of Holocaust Education, vol. 9, autumn/winter 2001/2002.
  • Brown, Rob, The Swedish Schindler who disappeared, BBC World Service, 1.02.2015, https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30934452. Dr. Paul Levine spoke to Witness on the BBC World Service, Released On 16 Jan 2015, last online on 17.10.2020.
  • Karlsson, Klas-Göran, “Tell Ye Your Children…”: The Twisted Swedish Road to Holocaust Recognition, in SCANDINAVIAN-CANADIAN STUDIES/ÉTUDES SCANDINAVES AU CANADA Vol. 23 (2016) pp.78-94.
  • Review for The Journal of Modern History; Sweden After Nazism; Politics and Culture in the Wake of the Second World War, Östling, J.
  • “Raoul Wallenberg and Swedish Humanitarian Policy in Budapest”, in Reaching a State of Hope; Refugees, Immigrants, and the Swedish Welfare State, 1930- 2000”, M. Byström & P. Frohnert (eds.), (Lund, 2013).
  • "Sweden’s Complicated Neutrality and the Rescue of Denmark’s Jews”, The Routledge History of the Holocaust, Friedman, J.C. (ed.), 2011.
  • Östling, J., “Nazisms sensmoral; Svenska erfarenheter i andra världkrigets efterdyning”
  • The Lessons of Nazism: Swedish Experiences in the Wake of the Second World War, with an English summary], (Stockholm: Atlantis, 2008).
  • “The “On-Looker” in Holocaust History and Historiography”, The Oxford Handbook of Holocaust Studies, J. Roth & P. Hayes (eds.), (Oxford University Press, autumn 2010).
  • “Teaching about “The Perpetrator” in a Global Context”, Forum21: European Journal on Child and Youth Policy, Council of Europe, August 2009.
  • ”Hitler och Förintelsen; Förföljelserna splittrade Sverige”, in Populär historia, 2/2009 [Hitler and the Holocaust; Persecutions Split Sweden].
  • “Sweden”, “Denmark”, “Norway”, “Raoul Wallenberg”, four entries on these subjects to “Dictionnaire de la Shoah”, Larousse Publishers, Paris (2009).
  • Zimmerman, J. (ed.) “Contested Memories: Poles and Jews during the Holocaust and its Aftermath; Huener, J., * “Auschwitz, Poland and the Politics of Commemoration”; Michlic, J.B. “Poland’s Threatening Other: The Image of the Jew from 1880 to the Present”, in vol. 14, #1, 2008.
  • "Raoul Wallenbergs uppdrag i Budapest; bakgrund och motiv“ [Raoul Wallenberg’s Mission in Budapest; Background and motives], in En problematisk relation? Flyktingpolitik och judiska flyktingar i Sverige, 1920- 1950, Lars M. Andersson & Mattias Tyden (eds), Opuscula Historica Upsaliensia 36, 2008, (translation LM Andersson & M Tyden), pp. 269-288
  • Forward to the Russian edition of “Righteous Gentile; the Story of Raoul Wallenberg, missing hero of the Holocaust”, by J. Bierman, (Olgert Liebkin Publishing House, Moscow, 2007)
  • Forward to the Swedish edition of ”In the Lion’s Den”, Ensam Mot Lejonet; En berättelse av en ung flicka I det nazistiska Europa, by S.A. Liebster, (Förlaget Gramma, 2007)
  • Review of, Hitler, the Jews and the Allies, by S. Aronson, in Intelligence and National Security Review, autumn 2007, volume 22, #2.
  • “From the Archive to the Classroom; Reflections on teaching the history of the Holocaust in Different Countries”, in M. Goldenburger, R. Millen (eds), The Tensions of Teaching, (University of Washington Press, 2007).
  • “On Hugo Valentin’s ´The Corpse Factory as a Symbol´, The Hugo Valentin Lectures, nr. IV, spring 2007.
  • "Holocaust Education in Sweden & Europe in the 21st century”, Encylopedia Judaica, 2nd edition, 2006.
  • "Document Report": One Day during the Holocaust: An Analysis of Raoul Wallenberg’s `Budapest Report´of 12 September 1944, in Holocaust Studies; A Journal of Culture and History, Volume 11, Winter 2005, #3.
  • "Whither Holocaust Studies in Sweden? Some Thoughts on Levande historia and Other Matters Swedish”, in Holocaust Studies; A Journal of Culture and History, vol. 11, summer 2005, #1.
  • "One Day during the Holocaust; An Analysis of Raoul Wallenberg’s Budapest report of 12 September, 1944”, in R. Björk, Alf W. Johansson (eds), Samtidshistoria och politik, (Stockholm, 2004).
  • “Attitudes and Action; Comparing the Responses of Mid-level Bureaucrats to the Holocaust”, in P. Levine & D. Cesarani (eds), Bystanders to the Holocaust; A Re-Evaluation, (Frank Cass, London), 2002 (the same article appears in the JHE cited above)
  • "Swedish Neutrality during the Second World War; Tactical Success or Moral Compromise?”, in N. Wylie (ed), European Neutrals and Non-Belligerents during the Second World War (Cambridge University Press), 2002.
  • "The historical background to and motives for Raoul Wallenberg’s appointment as a Swedish diplomat in Budapest, 1944”, commissioned contribution to Den svenska utrikesledningens agerande i fallet Raoul Wallenberg (UD 2001:3), (The official investigation of Sweden’s foreign policy leadership in the case of Raoul Wallenberg, Swedish Foreign Office (UD), published 2002.
  • “Teaching the History of the Holocaust in Different Countries: Problems and Possibilities”, in The Issues of the Holocaust Research in Latvia; Report of an International Conference, 16- 17 October, (Latvijas Universitates Latvijas vestures institutes), 2001
  • “Holocaust historiography in Sweden Today; New Promise after years of Disinterest?”, in R. Fjällström and S. Fruitman (eds), Sidor av Förintelsen, (Studentlitterateur, Lund), 2000
  • "Raoul Wallenberg-stiftelsens medalj till uppsalahistorikern Paul A. Levine“, 19 oktober 2012.
  • "Raoul Wallenberg i nytt ljus“, 17 mars 2010.
  • "The Hugo Valentin Lectures, VIII–IX".
  • "Hugo Valentin-föreläsningen 2014: Professor Dan Michman“, March 6, 2014.
  • Uppsala University Publications, Levine, Paul A., 2016-01-01.
  • Dagens Nyheter, Om detta ville Paul A Levine berätta, 2019-11-17.
  • Andersson, Lars M., „Paul A. Levine In memoriam“, 2019-11-17.
  • Yehuda Bauer, IHRA, Task Force on Holocaust Research, WW2, Genocide Studies.
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