Book•
Wartime Shanghai and the Jewish Refugees from Central Europe: Survival, Co-Existence, and Identity in a Multi-Ethnic City
02 Aug 2012-
TL;DR: The authors discusses the history of the Jewish refugees within the Shanghai setting and its relationship to the two established Jewish communities, the Sephardi and Russian Jews, focusing on the cultural life of the refugees who used both German and Yiddish, and their attempts to cope under Japanese occupation after the outbreak of the Pacific War.
Abstract: The study discusses the history of the Jewish refugees within the Shanghai setting and its relationship to the two established Jewish communities, the Sephardi and Russian Jews. Attention is also focused on the cultural life of the refugees who used both German and Yiddish, and on their attempts to cope under Japanese occupation after the outbreak of the Pacific War. Differences of identity existed between Sephardi and Ashkenazi Jews, religious and secular, aside from linguistic and cultural differences. The study aims to understand the exile condition of the refugees and their amazing efforts to create a semblance of cultural life in a strange new world.
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TL;DR: The authors explored the history of early-modern and modern China, from the seventeenth century to the present, examining the rise and fall of China's last empire, the emergence of a modern nation-state, the sources and development of revolution, and the implications of complex social, political, cultural, and economic transformations in the People's Republic of China.
Abstract: This course explores the history of early-modern and modern China, from the seventeenth century to the present. We will examine the rise and fall of China’s last empire, the emergence of a modern nation-state, the sources and development of revolution, and the implications of complex social, political, cultural, and economic transformations in the People’s Republic of China. Course materials include scholarly monographs, a memoir, primary sources, and visual and material artifacts that offer diverse perspectives. We will meet twice a week for a combination of lectures, discussion, and viewing of visual texts.
339 citations
Dissertation•
09 Sep 2019
TL;DR: The authors traces the mobilization of Canadian associations helping refugees during the Second World War and provides an intermediate perspective on Canadian assistance and reception throughout the conflict, between the history of migration policy and the study of population movements.
Abstract: This thesis traces the mobilization of Canadian associations helping refugees during the Second World War. The study of this collective mobilization - the refuge - sheds light on Canada's willingness to help in the face of the dangers and persecutions threatening refugees between December 1938 and October 1945. Based on the sources of the two main refugee actors in the refuge - the Canadian National Committee on Refugees (CNCR) and the committees of the Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC) - the thesis provides an intermediate perspective on Canadian assistance and reception throughout the conflict, between the history of migration policy and the study of population movements. By following the rhythm of the refuge, the thesis retraces the complex structure of collective mobilization made up of about ten organizations opposed by ideological, political and territorial rivalries. By pulling the threads out of this "associative knot bag", the study of the refuge highlights the categorization of the refugee in a Canada that does not distinguish them from traditional migrants. Faced with the government's refusal to admit refugees to Canada, collective mobilization does not remain isolated from the rest of the Canadian population and seeks its support to open Canada's borders to persecuted people. The shelter then developed two propaganda messages reflecting internal collaboration in collective mobilization, notably between the CJC's fundraising committee - the United Jewish Refugee and Relief Agencies - and the CNCR. Faced with the restrictive policy of the Canadian government, the shelter develops remote relief, participating in humanitarian aid carried out by American organizations, and determines an assistance strategy based on discretion. Its purpose is to bypass Canadian migration rules and prepare for the reception of potential refugees. The arrival of the refugees then appears as the highest point of the refuge.
95 citations
19 citations
01 Jan 2014
TL;DR: Hyman as mentioned in this paper argued that the manner in which the refugees experiences the approximately twelve years (1938-1950) they spent in Shanghai was informed by their nationality, gender, and age.
Abstract: Title of Document: “AN UNCERTAIN LIFE IN ANOTHER WORLD”: GERMAN AND AUSTRIAN JEWISH REFUGEE LIFE IN SHANGHAI, 19381950” Elizabeth Rebecca Hyman, Master of Arts, 2014 Directed by: Professor Marsha Rozenblit, History Between 1938 and 1941, 20,000 Eastern and Central European Jews fled to Shanghai. Through a close examination or memoirs and oral histories, I argue that the manner in which the refugees experiences the approximately twelve years (1938-1950) they spent in Shanghai was informed by their nationality, gender, and age. Further, I argue that the twelve years they spent in Shanghai eroded the refugee’s behavioral, material, and emotional connections to their old lives in Germany and Austria until all they had left was language and memories. “AN UNCERTAIN LIFE IN ANOTHER WORLD”: GERMAN AND AUSTRIAN JEWISH REFUGEE LIFE IN SHANGHAI, 1938-1950
5 citations
TL;DR: The arrival of about 1000 Polish Jews in Shanghai in 1941 has remained one of the footnotes of the Holocaust, even though most survived the War, unexpectedly trapped in the city as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: The arrival of about 1000 Polish Jews in Shanghai in 1941 has remained one of the footnotes of the Holocaust, even though most survived the War, unexpectedly trapped in the city. This article argue...
4 citations
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TL;DR: In a recent correspondence with the author, the now nonagenarian Levi-Strauss responded graciously but categorically: “I found out about the boat thanks to the Emergency Rescue Committee as discussed by the authors... Finally I obtained my ticket on board the Paul Lemerle.
Abstract: At the beginning of Tristes Tropiques, the famous anthropologist Claude LeviStrauss recalls being stranded in Marseilles in 1941, “already feeling like a potential concentration camp victim.”1 Armed with only an invitation from New York’s New School for Social Research, he “knew [he] must leave, but how?” Here, the ethnographer’s writings become terse, even cryptic: “from conversations in Marseilles, I learned that a boat was to leave soon for Martinique. . . . Finally I obtained my ticket on board the Paul Lemerle.”2 Could it have been this straightforward for a French Jew to leave the Free Zone for Martinique in early 1941? Or could his departure have been abetted by Varian Fry, the local representative of the Emergency Rescue Committee, an American organization devoted to saving leading anti-Nazi dissidents, intellectuals, and artists? Or perhaps he had been assisted by the Guadeloupean deputy Maurice Satineau, whom Vichy suspected of aiding Jews to escape?3 In a recent correspondence with the author, the now nonagenarian Levi-Strauss responded graciously but categorically: “I found out about the boat thanks to
11 citations
Book•
01 Jan 1999
TL;DR: Tobias' own coming-of-age story unfolds within his descriptions of Jewish life in Shanghai as discussed by the authors, a city offered shelter without requiring a visa: the notorious pleasure capital, Shanghai.
Abstract: In the wake of Kristallnacht, November 9, 1938, Sigmund Tobias and his parents made plans to flee a Germany that was becoming increasingly dangerous for them. Like many other European Jews, they faced the impossibility of obtaining visas to enter any other country in Europe or almost anywhere else in the world. One city offered shelter without requiring a visa: the notorious pleasure capital, Shanghai. Seventeen thousand Jewish refugees flocked to Hongkew, a section of Shanghai ruled by the Japanese.Beginning in December 1938 these refugees created an active community that continued to exist through the end of the war and was dissolved by the early 1950s. In this exotic sanctuary, Sigmund Tobias grew from a six-year-old child to an adolescent. Strongly attracted by the discipline and rigor of Talmudic study, Tobias entered the Mirrer Yeshiva, a rabbinical seminary transplanted from the Polish city of Mir. The money and food the 1,200 refugees of the Yeshiva received from the American Jewish community made them a privileged elite within the Shanghai Jewish community.Tobias' own coming-of-age story unfolds within his descriptions of Jewish life in Shanghai. Depleted by disease and hunger, constantly struggling with primitive and crowded conditions, the refugees faced shortages of food, clothing, and medicine that became increasingly severe as the war continued. Tobias observes the under life of Shanghai: the prostitution and black market profiteering, the brutal lives of the Chinese workers, the tensions between Chinese and Japanese during the war, and the paralyzing inflation and the approach of the communist 'liberators' afterward.Sheltered from what was happening in Europe, Tobias recounts the anguish of the refugees when news of the Holocaust finally reached them. Richly detailed, "Strange Haven" opens a little-documented chapter of the Holocaust and provides a fascinating glimpse of life for these foreigners in a foreign land. An epilogue describes the changes Tobias observed when he returned to Shanghai forty years later as a visiting professor.
6 citations
TL;DR: When the marco polo bridge incident occurred near peiping on july 7, 1937, Japan was not prepared to launch a long-term war with china.
Abstract: When the marco polo bridge incident occurred near peiping on july 7, 1937, japan was not prepared to launch a long-term war with china. on the contrary, she was hopeful that a little military pressure would result in a local settlement providing for North China autonomy and economic co-operation with Japan, which she had been demanding for several years. When the incident developed into a fullscale war toward the end of July, she declared that her army was only punishing the anti-Japanese 29th Army and particularly its 37th Division. Even after the war spread to Shanghai in August, Japan still insisted that the military operations were undertaken with the limited purpose of urging the Chinese National government to reconsider and to correct its attitude toward Japan. Although these were absurd explanations, they did reflect to a certain extent the true intention of the Japanese government. On the one hand, a war with China would not be favorably received by the Japanese people. Financial, circles stressed that only a general settlement with China would bring economic prosperity to Japan. Even the General Staff, which had Russia in mind, advised against it. On the other hand, however, the young officers in the army, with War Minister Sugiyama as their leader, advocated war, at least a limited one. They felt that the rising nationalism and the growing unification of China must be checked before China would accept Japanese leadership.
5 citations
31 Jan 1980
4 citations