Representing Perpetrators of Mass Violence

Conference Program

August 31

15.00 – 16.00
Registration/Welcome

16.00 – 17.30
Keynote Lecture
Scott Straus (University of Wisconsin, Madison)
Reflections on Studying Perpetrators in Rwanda

17.30 – 18.30
Reception

September 1

09.00 – 11.00
Justice and Its Evasion (Moderator: Ton Robben)

Stephanie Bird (UCL): Disguised Nazi Perpetrators and the Evasion of Justice
Mary Fulbrook (UCL): The Making and Un-Making of Perpetrators: Patterns of Involvement in Nazi Persecution
Stefanie Rauch (UCL): “I Was a Good German”: Agency, Identity, and Justice in Oral History Interviews from the Perpetrator Side

11.30 – 13.30
Images I (Moderator: Brianne McGonigle-Leyh)

Viktoria Sukovata (Kharkiv National University): The German Perpetrators in the Soviet and Post-Soviet Cinema on World War II: The Evolution of Representations
Piotr Osęka (Polish Academy of Sciences): The Evil on Posters. Representations of the Communist Past in Contemporary Public Discourse in Poland
Ina Markova (University of Vienna): Visual Strategies of Representing Perpetrators in Austria
Katarzyna Ruchel-Stockmans (Free University, Brussels): Between Testimony and Fictionalized Representation: Secondary Perpetrators in Omar Fast’s Spielberg’s List

13.30 – 15.00 Lunch

15.00 – 17.00
Perpetrators in the Media (Moderator: Iva Vukusic)

Fabio Salomoni (Koc University, Istanbul): From Perpetrators to Victims? On the Responsibility for the Madımak Hotel Massacre in Turkey
Katarina Ristic (Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg): Alleged War Criminals on Serbian TV
Suren Manukyan (Armenian Genocide Museum & Institute): The Red Sultan: The Image of Abdul Hamid II in the World Media
Güler Alkan (University of Graz): For the Defense of the Homeland? The Portrayal of Perpetrators in Turkish Public Discourse Between Condemning and Justifying the Armenian Genocide

17.30 – 19.15 Performance
The Woman at His Side
Sabine Werner, Inga Dietrich, and Joanne Gläsel
Followed by discussion
Location: Filmtheater ’t Hoogt (Hoogt 4)

19.30 Dinner

September 2

09.00 – 11.00
Images II (Moderator: Judith Keilbach)

Colman Hogan (Ryerson University, Toronto): The Portrait of Anwar Congo: Fetish and Disavowal in the Pervert-Perpetrator and Perpetrator Society
Stéphanie Benzaquen (Erasmus U, Rotterdam): From Perpetrator to Victim and Vice-versa: The Multiple Identities of S-21 Photographer Nhem En
Dragoş Manea and Mihaela Precup (U of Bucharest): The Perpetrator as Punch-line: Hipster Hitler and the Politics of Controversial Humor
Véronique Bragard (UC Louvain): Figuring King Leopold II in Comics and the Indictment of Perpetration

11.30 – 13.30
Ordinary or Evil? (Moderator: Geraldien von Frijtag)

Zachary Goldberg (University of Regensburg): Ordinary or Evil? Reflections on a False Dichotomy
Kjell Anderson (NIOD): The Perpetrator Imaginary
Timothy Williams (Marburg University): Perpetrators, Bystanders, Victims, or Even Heroes? How Former Cadres of the Khmer Rouge Represent Themselves in Interviews
Eva van Roekel (Utrecht University): A Quiet Disgrace: Representing Military Officers Indicted for Crimes against Humanity in Argentina

13.30 – 14.30 Lunch

14.30 – 16.30
Perpetrator Perspectives (Moderator: Kári Driscoll)

Sue Vice (University of Sheffield): The Literary Voices of Perpetrators
Dana Mihailescu (University of Bucharest): The Festering Consciousness of an SS Medical Doctor: Representations of Johann Paul Kremer’s Diary in Thomas Duranteau’s Des miettes et des étoiles (2012)
Lena Seauve (Humboldt University Berlin): Historical Narratives, the Perpetrator’s Perspective and the Disgust of the Reader

17.00 – 18.15
Film Screening
Hate Radio, dir. Milo Rau (2014)
Location: Filmtheater ’t Hoogt (Hoogt 4)

18.30 – 19.30
Keynote Lecture
Milo Rau (International Institute of Political Murder)
Violence, Research, Realism: An Insight Into Some Works of the IIPM
Location: Filmtheater ’t Hoogt (Hoogt 4)

20.00 Dinner at Academiegebouw

September 3

10.00 – 12.00
Gender Trouble (Moderator: Doro Wiese)

Susanne Luhmann (University of Alberta): Gendering Mass Perpetration: Female Guards and Male Officers at the Former Concentration Camp for Women Ravensbrück
Clare Bielby (University of Hull): Perpetrating Terrorist Selves: Violence, Gender and Emotion in Post-Terrorist Life-Writing in the Federal Republic of Germany
Ingjerd Veiden Brakstad (Norwegian U. of Science and Technology): “Born to Fight” and “Death Defying Warriors”: Representations of Serb Perpetrators in the Norwegian Media 1992–1995
Katerina Krulisova (Nottingham Trent University): Female Perpetrators of Genocide and Genocidal Rape: Critical Feminist Discourse Analysis on Plavsic and Nyiramasuhuko

12.00 – 13.00 Lunch

13.00 – 15.00
Memory and the Arts (Moderator: Nicole Immler)

Nanor Kebranian (Columbia University): Performing Justice: (Re)Defining the Perpetrator in Hagop Oshagan’s Post Genocide Plays
Philippe Mesnard (Blaise Pascal University, Clermont-Ferrand): A Dialogue between Imre Kertész, Jean Améry and Primo Levi about Culture, Violence and Perpetrators
Robyn Bloch (U of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg): Feeling Sorry for Prime Evil Is Feeling Sorry for Yourself: South African Perpetrators as Victims

15.15 – 16.15 Closing Discussion