Teaching and Learning About Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity: Fundamental Issues and Pedagogical Approaches by Samuel Totten, a renowned scholar of genocide studies and Professor Emeritus, College of Education and Health Professions, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, is a culmination of 30 years in the field of genocide studies and education. In writing this book, Totten reports that he “crafted this book along the lines of what he wished had been available to him when he first began teaching about genocide back in the mid-1980s. That is, a book that combines the best of genocide theory, the realities of the genocidal process, and how to teach about such complex and often terrible and difficult issues and facts in a theoretically, historically and pedagogically sound manner.” As the last book he will ever write on education and educating about genocide, he perceives the book as his gift to those educators who have the heart and grit to tackle such an important issue in their classrooms.

Teaching about Genocide presents the insights, advice, and suggestions of secondary-level teachers and professors, in relation to teaching about various facets of genocide. The contributions range from basic concerns when teaching about genocide to a discussion about why it is critical to teach students about more general human rights violations during a course on genocide, and from a focus on specific cases of genocide to a range of pedagogical strategies for teaching about genocide.

This book presents the insights, advice and suggestions of secondary level teachers and professors in relation to teaching about various facets of genocide. The contributions are extremely eclectic, ranging from the basic concerns when teaching about genocide to a discussion as to why it is critical to teach students about more general human rights violations during a course on genocide, and from a focus on specific cases of genocide to various pedagogical strategies ideal for teaching about genocide.

A central question raised by many educators and students is why teach and learn about the Holocaust when other crimes against humanity are perpetrated today? A clear and well-informed understanding of the Holocaust, the paradigmatic genocide, may help educators and students understand other genocides, mass atrocities, and human rights violations. The study of the Holocaust can aide in our obligation to develop a model that highlights the warning signs and predisposing factors for human violence and genocide. In this series of documents, the ITF's Education Working Group offers ideas and recommendations to educators who wish to teach about the Holocaust and its relationship to other genocides and crimes against humanity. The documents were released for publication by decision of the ITF Plenary in December 2010.

Political or social groups wanting to commit mass murder on the basis of racial, ethnic or religious differences are never hindered by a lack of willing executioners. In Becoming Evil, social psychologist James Waller uncovers the internal and external factors that can lead ordinary people to commit extraordinary acts of evil. Waller debunks the common explanations for genocide- group think, psychopathology, unique cultures- and offers a more sophisticated and comprehensive psychological view of how anyone can potentially participate in heinous crimes against humanity. He outlines the evolutionary forces that shape human nature, the individual dispositions that are more likely to engage in acts of evil, and the context of cruelty in which these extraordinary acts can emerge. Illustrative eyewitness accounts are presented at the end of each chapter. An important new look at how evil develops, Becoming Evil will help us understand such tragedies as the Holocaust and recent terrorist events. Waller argues that by becoming more aware of the things that lead to extraordinary evil, we will be less likely to be surprised by it and less likely to be unwitting accomplices through our passivity.