Teaching the Holocaust

I assigned book one of Maus: A Survivor’s Tale to a “Writing About Literature” class, the designated writing-intensive course for our English majors.

The students discussed the abrupt ending, the use of ethnic stereotypes, and of course the comic book medium itself. One student’s “Hearing through Yiddish… Seeing in Ink…” is particularly thoughtful.

About a third of the class went on to read book two, even though it wasn’t on the syllabus; one student read the book aloud to her nine-year-old sister.

This weekend, Seton Hill is home to a conference sponsored by the National Catholic Center for Holocaust Education.  I’m canceling all my classes during one day of the conference.