04809cam a22004458i 4500 23697278 US-DLC 20260302121247.0 240517s2024 nju b 001 0 eng 2024018311 9780691261706 (hardback) 9780691261683 (ebook) 23697278 au eng rda au pcc e-gx--- Alfaisal Main Library HQ755.5.G3 H47 2024 Herzog, Dagmar, 1961- author. The question of unworthy life : eugenics and Germany's twentieth century / Dagmar Herzog. 2024 2410 Princeton : Princeton University Press, 2024 302pages cm text txt rdacontent unmediated n rdamedia volume nc rdacarrier Includes bibliographical references and index. The problem of incurability -- Love, money, murder -- How does one recognize a crime? -- The fascism in the heads -- Socialist humanism confronts disabled life. "Between 1939 and 1945, Nazi genocide claimed the lives of nearly three hundred thousand people diagnosed with psychiatric illness or cognitive deficiencies. Not until the 1980s would these murders, as well as the coercive sterilizations of some four hundred thousand others classified as "feeble-minded," be officially acknowledged as crimes at all. The Question of Unworthy Life charts this history from its origins in prewar debates about the value of disabled lives to our continuing efforts to unlearn eugenic thinking today. Drawing on a wealth of rare archival evidence, Dagmar Herzog sheds light on how Germany became the only modern state to implement a plan to eradicate cognitive impairment from the entire body politic. She traces how eugenics emerged from the flawed premise that intellectual deficiency was biologically hereditary, and how this crude explanatory framework diverted attention from the actual economic and clinical causes of disability. Herzog describes how the vilification of the disabled was dressed up as the latest science and reveals how Christian leaders and prominent educators were complicit in amplifying and legitimizing Nazi policies. Exposing the driving forces behind the Third Reich's first genocide and its persistent legacy today, The Question of Unworthy Life recovers the stories of the unsung advocates for disability rights who challenged the aggressive victimization of the disabled and developed alternative approaches to cognitive impairment based on ideals of equality, mutuality, and human possibility"-- "The dark history of eugenic thought in Germany from the nineteenth century to today-and the courageous countervoicesBetween 1939 and 1945, Nazi genocide claimed the lives of nearly three hundred thousand people diagnosed with psychiatric illness or cognitive deficiencies. Not until the 1980s would these murders, as well as the coercive sterilizations of some four hundred thousand others classified as "feeble-minded," be officially acknowledged as crimes at all. The Question of Unworthy Life charts this history from its origins in prewar debates about the value of disabled lives to our continuing efforts to unlearn eugenic thinking today.Drawing on a wealth of rare archival evidence, Dagmar Herzog sheds light on how Germany became the only modern state to implement a plan to eradicate cognitive impairment from the entire body politic. She traces how eugenics emerged from the flawed premise that intellectual deficiency was biologically hereditary, and how this crude explanatory framework diverted attention from the actual economic and clinical causes of disability. Herzog describes how the vilification of the disabled was dressed up as the latest science and reveals how Christian leaders and prominent educators were complicit in amplifying and legitimizing Nazi policies.Exposing the driving forces behind the Third Reich's first genocide and its persistent legacy today, The Question of Unworthy Life recovers the stories of the unsung advocates for disability rights who challenged the aggressive victimization of the disabled and developed alternative approaches to cognitive impairment based on ideals of equality, mutuality, and human possibility"-- Eugenics Germany History 20th century. People with disabilities Nazi persecution. Euthanasia Germany History 20th century. Involuntary sterilization Germany History 20th century. HISTORY / Modern / 20th Century / Holocaust bisacsh MEDICAL / History bisacsh Print books. local 4 lcc BOOKS 608438 608438 0 0 lcc 0 0 AU AU GEN 2026-03-02 0 HQ755.5.G3 H47 2024 AU00000000021349 2026-03-02 12:15:00 250.00 2026-03-02 BOOKS