From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany carried out a campaign to "cleanse" German society of individuals viewed as biological threats to the nation's "health." Enlisting the help of physicians and medically trained geneticists, psychiatrists, and anthropologists, the Nazis developed racial health policies that began with the mass sterilization of "genetically diseased" persons and ended with the near annihilation of European Jewry.
To relate this history, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has assembled objects, photographs, documents, and historic film footage from European and American collections and presents them in settings evoking medical and scientific environments. Deadly Medicine: Creating the Master Race inspires reflection on the continuing attraction of biological utopias that promote the possibility of human perfection. From the early twentieth-century international eugenics movements to present-day dreams of eliminating inherited disabilities through genetic manipulation, the issues remain timely.
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum's educational initiative on Deadly Medicine: Creating the Master Race has been underwritten in part by The David Berg Foundation; the Dorot Foundation; The Blanche and Irving Laurie Foundation; The Lerner Foundation; The Rosenbluth Family–Al, Sylvia, Bill, and Jerry; Eric F. and Lore Ross; The Samberg Family Foundation; and the Viterbi Family Foundation of the Jewish Community Foundation of San Diego.
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum exhibitions program is supported in part by the Lester Robbins and Sheila Johnson Robbins Traveling and Temporary Exhibitions Fund, established in 1990.
Dr. Susan Bachrach
“Deadly Medicine: Creating the Master Race shows how the Nazi regime under Adolf Hitler aimed to change the genetic make-up of the population through measures known as ‘racial hygiene.’”
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