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Podcast: New Books in German Studies
Episode: Svenja Bethke, "Dance on the Razor's Edge: Crime and Punishment in the Nazi Ghettos" (U Toronto Press, 2021)
Description: The ghettos established by the Nazis in German-occupied Eastern Europe during the Second World War have mainly been seen as lawless spaces marked by brutality, tyranny, and the systematic murder of the Jewish population. Drawing on examples from the Warsaw, Lodz, and Vilna ghettos, Dance on the Razor's Edge: Crime and Punishment in the Nazi Ghettos (University of Toronto Press, 2021) explores how under these circumstances highly improvised legal spheres emerged in these coerced and heterogeneous ghetto communities.Looking at sources from multiple archives and countries, this book investigates how the Jewish Councils, set up on German orders, fo...