In the April-issue Maciej Moszynski (Poznań/Berlin) traces out the position of Głos within the publishing landscape of Poland, a literary, social and political weekly paper. The central focus lies on the paper’s ambition to implore new perspectives into the public debate, which aim at rejecting liberalism as well as gradually labeling Jews as enemies of polish society. The paper therefore functions as an extraordinary means for an ideological amalgamation of modern anti-Semitism and polish nationalism. Nike Thurn (Trier) sets her focus in research on anti-Semitism on fictitious “Jewish” identities and characters which are read as “Jewish” and addresses issues concerning their intertextual functions and the historical context of such “games” with identity, role and determination.

Claudia Pawlowitsch and Alexander Kästner (Dresden) contribute to the field of siucidology with a locally linked case: they shed light onto the collective and religiously intended efforts of Dresden’s Jewish community for a corpse to be delivered from the authorities of city and state. This Jew, dubbed “Judas Pollack” had killed himself at the end of 1771 in Dresden’s Amtsfronfeste. In the series “Jewish female writers – Rediscovered” Jana Mikota (Siegen) reminds us of Alice Berend. Uri Kaufmann (Heidelberg) explores the dwellings and ritual purifications of Jewish women in European mikves since the early modern age.

Karolin Oppermann (Göttingen) points out Christian authors in the Sulamith, which is considered the first Jewish periodical in german language and script and was published between 1806 and 1843. On the one hand she asks for the content of the contributions in relation to the journals declared aims. On the other hand she asks for the attributed roles of authors in the publishing discourse of a embourgeoisement of Jews. Hans Joachim Seiler (Kusel) develops a small etymology of the hebrew “belt”. Cornelia Siebeck (Berlin) offers insights into the institutionalization of remembrance in the case of the Flossenbürg concentration camp and focuses on two exhibitions “Konzentrationslager Flossenbürg 1938-1945” (2007) and “was bleibt – Nachwirkungen des Konzentrationslager Flossenbürg” (2010).

Bettina Joergens (Detmold) introduces a greater audience to a large number of audio-recordings of interviews with Holocaust survivors from the State Archive of North Rhine-Westphalia, while Eva-Maria Thimme (Berlin) presents a collection form the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, which contains rare publications from “Displaced Persons”-camps inside the american occupied territories of post-WWII Germany.

Merit Kegel (Leipzig) introduces the pedagogic approaches of the capitol archive in Leipzig; a unique means in Saxony for mediating jewish history. Matthias Heyl (Neustrelitz/Ravensbrück) examines the DVD “Vernehmung. Pädagogische Auseinandersetzung mit Täterinnen und Tätern im Nationalsozialismus” which MEDAON’s founding association, HATiKVA e.V., offers for trans-regional use.

As usual, a number of reviews are examine scholarly publications. However, at this point the edition by Felix Korsch (Leipzig) should find special mentioning. It evaluates recent contributions on the relation of Germany’s political left to anti-Semitism, Israel and the Arab-Israeli conflict.

The current edition of Medaon would not have been possible without the help of Wendy Anne Kopisch, Irina Suttner Phillip Roth and Stefan Schwarz as well as the reviewers. Corrections were done by Cathleen Bürgelt and by Gunther Gebhard and Steffen Schröter of text plus form – the editors wish to thank them very much.

The editors of Medaon in April 2011.