3. Social and Cultural life in the Nazi state: role of Hitler Youth, Women, religion

Question 1

role of Hitler Youth?

Answer 1

played central role in social and cultural life

Question 2

By controlling minds of youth, Nazis believed?

Answer 2

they would control the future.

Question 3

Hitler Youth: what was Hitler’s famous dictum?

Answer 3

was ‘give me their minds until they are 13 and you will have a Nazi for life’

Question 4

Hitler Youth: role of Hitler Jugend?

Answer 4

organised camps solely for the indoctrination of young boys to become soldiers for the Fatherland and girls to bear Aryan children

Question 5

Hitler Youth: what was taught?

Answer 5

toughness and self-discipline and loyalty and obedience to superiors

Question 6

Hitler Youth: emphasis on?

Answer 6

good health and fitness

Question 7

Hitler Youth: German Youth Org. prevailed all over Germany, and dictated ?

Answer 7

what subjects young people studied at school and in universities, such as ‘German Physics’ and ‘Aryan History’ (courses rewritten to reflect philosophy of Nazi state)

Question 8

Hitler Youth: poster for Hitler Youth source

Answer 8

“Youth serves the Fuhrer. All ten-year-old boys into the Hitler Youth”

Question 9

Hitler Youth: Michael Burleigh quote on changes of children

Answer 9

“in sum, children appeared to have become more brutal, fitter and stupider than they (their parents) were”

Question 10

Resistance in Youth: why resist?

Answer 10

Nazi officials worried at elements of resistance and non-conformity in behaviour of thousands of young ppl who had grown tired of regimentation and demands of youth movement

Question 11

Women: negative impact of Nazi?

Answer 11

liberated during Weimer Republic, now lived under Nazi regime that wanted to end these freedoms and return women to kitchen

Question 12

Women: German women were relegated to ?

Answer 12

producing racially pure and healthy children for the Fatherland

Question 13

Women: how were mothers rewarded?

Answer 13

Hitler awarded medals to women who had the greatest number of babies. Mother’s Day was celebrated on Hitler’s birthday

Question 14

Women: what was made to help increase birth rate?

Answer 14

Laws made and financial incentives provided to help increase birth rate such as tax relief and reduction in mortgage payments

Question 15

Women: 1939 what was outlawed?

Answer 15

abortion outlawed, not for Jewish women though

Question 16

Women: Many women forced to bear children of? why?

Answer 16

SS officers to populate the ‘master race’

Question 17

Women: however, what do historians question?

Answer 17

how successful the policies to promote birth rate were

Question 18

Women: why do historians question it?

Answer 18

During 1930s, no. of marriages increased but no. of children per family did not. Average family in 1930s remained a ‘two-child’ family despite attempts by gov

Question 19

Women: what slogan was philosophy by which German women were ordered to live?

Answer 19

Kinder, Kuche, Kirche (children, kitchen, church)

Question 20

Women: what happened to most female workers?

Answer 20

dismissed from their jobs

Question 21

Women: Richard Overy?

Answer 21

“…the new woman idealised in a hundred propaganda posters, a contented and competent helpmate for her man, but above all, a model of heroic fecundity”

Question 22

Religion: what happened 1933?

Answer 22

Nazis signed an agreement (Concordat) with Catholic Church

Question 23

Religion: What did Concordat mean?

Answer 23

agreed that Nazi Party would not interfere with Church and the Church should stay out of politics.

Question 24

Religion: did Hitler keep his words?

Answer 24

Hitler did not keep his word, and many catholic priests were arrested, schools closed and monasteries shut

Question 25

Religion: what did nazi party attempt to rally?

Answer 25

rally all protestants under banner of Evangelical Reich Church

Question 26

Religion: what did Hitler attempt to do?

Answer 26

to rewrite history of Bible and remove all trace of Jewish links

Question 27

Religion: how did They go further with invasion of religion?

Answer 27

Went further by making ‘Twenty Five Points of the German Religion’

Question 28

Religion: what ideas present in ‘Twenty Five Points of the German Religion’ ?

Answer 28

Swastika was now the symbol of German Christianity

Hitler was new Messiah whose purpose is to save world from power of Jews

Question 29

Religion: what was Goebbels successful in?

Answer 29

lessening power and influence of church in Germany

Question 30

Religion: what did Goebbels control?

Answer 30

controlled the media with a vast network of propaganda that infiltrated every aspect of media, education and daily life in Germany

Question 31

Religion: Michael Burleigh?

Answer 31

“…Few German Christians grasped that this was preparatory, once the Jews had gone, to eradicating Christianity itself”