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During the week of 21 to 27 October 2013, the Academy of the Jewish Museum Berlin, in cooperation with Kulturkind e.V., will host readings, workshops, and an open day for the public with the theme “Multifaceted: a book week on diversity in children’s and young adult literature.” Employees of various departments have been vigorously reading, discussing, and preparing a selection of books for the occasion. Some of these books have already been introduced here over the course of the last weeks.
When my little 6-year-old daughter said to me, “you know, Mama, being gay seems strange to me,” I didn’t discuss it with her for too long. Instead I headed out and bought a copy of Alles Familie! Vom Kind der neuen Freundin vom Bruder von Papas früherer Frau und anderen Verwandten (All in the Family! About Daddy’s ex-wife’s brother’s new girlfriend’s kid and other relatives) since nothing is strange in this book. Every form of cohabitation that people engage in is introduced completely impartially: → continue reading

During the week of 21 to 27 October 2013, the Academy of the Jewish Museum Berlin, in cooperation with Kulturkind e.V., will host readings, workshops, and an open day for the public with the theme “Multifaceted: a book week on diversity in children’s and young adult literature.” Employees of various departments have been vigorously reading, discussing, and preparing a selection of books for the occasion. Some of these books have already been introduced here over the course of the last weeks.

Unlike German literature for young adults, the range of children’s books on the subject of diversity is still marginal. Usually books about diversity are transposed to the animal kingdom, or they depict ‘alien’ cultures by having foreign children invite their German school friends to an ethnic celebration. The Jewish Passover holiday, the Muslim Eid-al-Fitr, or, alternatively, the Chinese New Year, are described with one and the same formula: mom prepares the celebratory meal, dad explains the origins of the holiday, and the kids watch the central rites until they have to go to bed. Most of these books have no real plot.

Ingke Brodersen chose a different approach: she tells her story from the perspective of a little boy named Sascha, who emigrated from Russia to Berlin. → continue reading

There are people who visit the special exhibition “The Whole Truth” not once or twice but a few dozen times: museum guides, those of us who accompany visitors through the exhibition. This time, though, our job isn’t to introduce the exhibits and their deeper meaning but instead to elicit commentary from this very real and tangible general public – and to moderate any discussion that follows. After all, the questions on which the exhibition is based also came from visitors. The museum reflects them in a great number of objects that the curators sought out.

Barometer for the question “Are Jews particularly …?” in the exhibition “The Whole Truth”
© Jewish Museum Berlin, photo: Linus Lintner

The exhibits are very various and consistently surprising; they strike a wide range of cadences as well. Most visitors are astounded and speechless at the chutzpah of some curatorial arrangements. But as soon as a group begins to move through the exhibition and to engage with its guide, the speechlessness transforms into eloquence. → continue reading