Since Hamas’ terrorist attack against Israel, teachers have had to deal with anti-Semitism at school more frequently. Universities are responding with new course offerings to strengthen young educators.
“You Jew” is often heard as a swear word in the schoolyard or while riding on the school bus. Even at secondary schools or high schools, teachers notice, especially among younger students under the age of 16, that they consciously adopt anti-Semitic formulations or negligently parrot them.
In federal states such as Baden-Württemberg or Hesse, where reporting anti-Semitic acts in schools is mandatory, the number of reported incidents has only increased slightly. But according to Michael Blume, the number of unreported cases is high.
Blume is the anti-Semitism commissioner for the Baden-Württemberg state government. In his experience, it is often not recorded when rap texts with anti-Semitic content are spread in schoolyards.
“Teachers have good written material so that they can provide professional information about anti-Semitism in class,” says Blume. However, schools often lack digital media with which young people could be better informed through videos or explanatory podcasts.
Michael Blume is the anti-Semitism commissioner for Baden-Württemberg.
Anti-Semitic imagery in rap videos
Katrin Streif, a history teacher at the Zwilling-Scholl-Gymnasium in Stuttgart, reports on a rap song that was intensively discussed in one of her classes. She analyzed the song “Apocalypse” by the rapper “Kollegah” with her students. In the video for the song, a figure sits in front of a screen and controls world events. She wears a ring with a Star of David on one finger.
From the teacher’s perspective, many students did not notice that the video subtly conveyed anti-Semitic narratives. In this case, students learned a lot about anti-Semitic imagery in just one lesson. But it is usually only the younger teachers who can offer their classes more intensive insights into internet forums and also question popular influencer appearances.
The President of the Central Council of Jews, Josef Schuster, speaks of a “deficit in schools because this topic is not given the importance that it should be given in the school environment.” In his experience, science teachers are often overwhelmed when anti-Semitic slogans suddenly appear on school desks in their lessons or when hatred of Jews and denigrating prejudices against Jewish people in Germany spread in class.
Apparently, in teacher training, too little emphasis has been placed on preparing educators for anti-Semitism that may arise in school lessons, says Schuster.
Universities strengthen teachers in dealing with anti-Semitism
In response to this development, the University of Würzburg is offering its own “Anti-Semitism” course in schools. And at the University of Education (PH) in Ludwigsburg, students can spend several years building up expertise in dealing with anti-Semitic opinions and attitudes among students in a new study profile.
Tobias Arand, one of the professors who developed this study profile, wants to use this voluntary additional training to give his students knowledge about the origins of anti-Semitism or important details about everyday Jewish life.
“In surveys of students at our PH, we repeatedly find that they don’t know enough about everyday prejudices against Jews,” says Arand. “For example, at the beginning of the Nazi era in Germany, many Jewish residents were not rich and enterprising, but rather had to live modestly.”
Tobias Arand finds that many teachers know too little about anti-Semitism.
Too little knowledge about Jewish life in Germany
Arand and his colleagues at the PH Ludwigsburg also investigated why the phrase “You Jew” is increasingly being used as a swear word among students. In his opinion, some young people are also confronted with right-wing extremist ideas in their parents’ home.
Others adopt prejudices against Jews whose parents brought them to Germany from the Middle East. However, Arand also says that although Muslim anti-Semitism is currently being heavily discussed in the German public, the real danger, in his opinion, comes from right-wing extremist anti-Semitism. According to Arand, this is quantitatively more widespread than the Muslim one in Germany.
Further information on the topic can be found in SWR podcast “The school is burning” in the ARD audio library.