ABSTRACT
In 1945, only about 15-20,000 Jewish citizens continued their lives in post-Nazi Germany. The majority were survivors of the Shoah. In 1991 a special agreement between Germany and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) gave any Jewish person from the CIS the right to immigrate into Germany. In due course the number of Jews in Germany slowly rose to reach about 200,000 in 2022.
This chapter presents the results of a qualitative explorative study on the biographies of second/third generation (2g/3g) offspring of survivors of Nazi persecution living in Germany today. It aims at eliciting the various aspects of the special trauma inheritance from this target group with view to their lives in Germany and their dependence on professional carers when in need of nursing care.
Semi-structured interviews based on the method of Grounded Theory were employed to investigate their social and family situation. Findings confirm that religion next to culture combined with a high education level is one of the keys to Jewish identity in Germany, and consequently a key to a person-centered nursing care.
