Projects

Since 2020, the "Lower Saxony Memorials Development department" has been working with the Open Science Lab of the TIB - Leibniz Information Centre for Science and Technology as part of the project "Places of Gestapo Terror" to comprehensively depict the locations, activities and infrastructure of the Nazi police repression apparatus in the territory of present-day Lower Saxony in the form of a digital map. The project, which is funded by the Lower Saxony Ministry of Science and Culture, will be expanded in terms of content and supplemented with digital OERs (freely available educational materials) in a second funding phase until the end of 2025.

The Wikibase-based project platform enables the further development of the project results along a Citizen Science Approach even after the end of the project period and makes the research database a public resource that is permanently maintained by employees of the participating institutions.

How can we remember where we come from and who we are today as a democratic society without closing ourselves off to the digital transformation of knowledge culture for fear of nationalism and hatred? As part of the WikiRemembrance project at the TIB - Leibniz Information Centre for Science and Technology, which was funded by the "Future Discourses" programme of the Lower Saxony Ministry of Science and Culture in 2023 and 2024, a collective of authors from memorial sites (including the Lower Saxony Memorials Foundation), libraries, associations and individuals has produced a handout, which can be downloaded here. This handout is intended as a contribution to the discussion and a guide to reflective digital practice in the culture of remembrance. It describes current challenges in the culture of remembrance and provides suggestions on how these can be met with the help of tools and practices that have proven their worth on Wikidata, Wikipedia and similar platforms. Above all, an intelligent combination of digital and analogue methods appears to be profitable. Thanks to their extended reach, more flexible participation options, adaptability and scalability, digital formats are a valuable addition to analogue offerings without, however, replacing them.

The "Silent Heroes and Silent Heroines in what is now Lower Saxony and Bremen" remembrance portal was developed jointly by the Lower Saxony State Institute for School Quality Development and the Lower Saxony Memorials Foundation. It invites schools and interested citizens to engage with people who helped persecuted people during the National Socialist dictatorship. The Collection of Rescue Attempts from Lower Saxony and Bremen is intended as a political education programme, a virtual place of remembrance and a call for active participation, research and documentation. It is to be continuously expanded.

The November pogroms of 1938 marked the transition from the exclusion of Jews under National Socialism to their systematic violent persecution. In what is now the state of Lower Saxony, the Nazi mob also abused and murdered Jewish men, women and children on 9 and 10 November 1938, set synagogues on fire and destroyed the homes and businesses of Jewish owners.

The project ‘November Pogroms 1938 in Lower Saxony’ shows where racist and anti-Semitic agitation and exclusion lead and what it means when self-proclaimed ‘master races’ elevate themselves above those they consider inferior and ‘worthless’. The website aims to offer interested parties the opportunity to gain a location-based overview of the events in Lower Saxony and their consequences: What happened in my hometown in November 1938? Who were the perpetrators, what happened to the victims? What traces can still be found today? Where can I find more detailed information for further research? Are there any local history and memorial initiatives?

The project was launched in 2018 on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the November pogroms as part of a practical seminar at the History Department of Leibniz University Hannover in cooperation with the Lower Saxony Memorials Foundation. Numerous initiatives, memorial sites and individuals from many parts of Lower Saxony have joined the joint project.

To the website ‘November Pogroms 1938 in Lower Saxony’