Guest Editors
Zehavit Gross, Bar-Ilan University, Israel
Doyle Stevick, University of South Carolina

Scope and Topics
This issue of Prospects will explore the actual policies and practices of Holocaust education in countries and classrooms around the world. Worldwide, Holocaust education is entangled with contemporary political controversies and geopolitical struggles, perceptions of the state of Israel and the situation of the Palestinian people. Perhaps because Holocaust education is highly politicized, editors do not have much sober empirical research about the actual policies and practices of Holocaust education around the world. This issue seeks to provide a solid empirical basis for discussions of Holocaust education, its policies and practices, and the broader political contexts that facilitate or inhibit it.

Holocaust education is linked not just to history, but particularly to civic education issues. Studying the Holocaust is often justified by the need to help secure the future against further violations of human rights whether based on ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation or disability. Does it accomplish those ends? At a time when many societies are more diverse than ever before, legitimate concerns about nationalism and xenophobia underscore the importance of an inquiry into whether knowledge of the Holocaust does function to develop mutual understanding and respect.

The guest-editors invite contributors from diverse fields, perspectives and societies to submit research about any aspect of Holocaust education. Does Holocaust education change attitudes towards minority groups? Does linking commemoration and classroom study support or undermine its adoption? Has research into Holocaust bystanders helped to address bullying in schools? Does adoption of a Holocaust day in schools lessen the time devoted to the subject by limiting it to one designated day? Does emphasis on the unique aspects of the Holocaust lessen its impact in societies that have strong national narratives of suffering? Does linking national suffering and academic study of the Holocaust prevent students from understanding the particular dynamics of the Holocaust? Does the historical knowledge and understanding of the Holocaust decline when emphasis is placed on contemporary applications? Does the emotional power of the Holocaust make teachers feel unequipped to handle the subject adequately? These are difficult, contested and heated issues. The editors believe that these questions can best be discussed if high-quality, sober empirical research can provide us with data about these and related issues.

Submission Guidelines
To be considered for publication, manuscripts (7000-8000 words) should be submitted via email to the Prospects Editorial Office, by May 1st, 2009. After an initial screening, the guest-editors will send out for blind, external review only those manuscripts which are developed sufficiently to warrant such review. Please address any questions you may have about this special issue to Dr. Simona Popa, at: ibe.prospects@unesco.org.