Prof. Dr. Hagen Fleischer Honored with German Federal Cross of Merit
Historian receives award for research on Second World War and how it is dealt with in Greece and Germany
№ 273/2018 from Oct 16, 2018
Hagen Fleischer, a historian at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, has been awarded the First Class Merit Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in recognition of his contribution to the study of the history of the German occupation of Greece. Hagen Fleischer is co-director of a joint project of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens and the Center for Digital Systems (CeDiS) at Freie Universität Berlin. As part of the project, a digital archive was set up, which includes video interviews with eyewitnesses of the occupation of Greece by Nazi Germany.
The Federal Cross of Merit was presented by the German ambassador in Athens, Jens Plötner. He said that Hagen Fleischer’s research “provided the basis for a fact-based discussion of the German occupation of Greece and its aftermath.” Further, Fleischer’s activities have made the scope and consequences of German crimes in Greece known to a broad public in Germany. “In him, we recognize a champion against the appropriation and dangerous instrumentalization of historiography and for overcoming stereotypes on both sides,” said Plötner.
Hagen Fleischer studied history and journalism. In 1977 he earned his doctorate from Freie Universität Berlin. He has been teaching at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens since 1992. His main areas of research are the German National Socialist occupation policy in Europe and the consequences of the Second World War.
Contact
Prof. Dr. Nicolas Apostolopoulos, Center for Digital Systems, Freie Universität Berlin, and director of the project “Memories of the Occupation in Greece,” Email: nicolas.apostolopoulos@cedis.fu-berlin.de
Link
Homepage of the “Memories of the Occupation in Greece”: www.occupation-memories.org/en/