Reviewing the the so-called “Second Historian's Debate”, in which he had played such an important role, in February 2022, Michael Rothberg wrote that the opponents to his multidirectional approach were confusing history and memory. “Naturally, history and memory cannot be entirely separated from each other, but the target of my own work and also of Moses's catechism essay is public memory, not historical scholarship.” I understand what he means about not targeting the discipline. Rothberg and Moses are both aware that many positions controversial in the German public sphere have long been accepted in the academy, a distinction they clearly make in their critiques. But the comment did prompt me to wonder whether part of the problem of the debate is that Rothberg's and Moses's critique of memory practices is actually more about history than it lets on.

The politics of history and memory culture have recently been the topic of increased discussion again—and this discussion has by no means been cool-headed, but hot, with a high potential for conflict. An argument is ongoing in the public sphere over which (hi)stories are present and visible and which are not, who is being recognized and who is not, as well as what is being forgotten, repressed, or tacitly accepted in this context. Corresponding to this general development, a debate is currently ongoing in the German press that has been dubbed “Historikerstreit 2.0,” or “the historians’ debate reloaded.” The controversy was initially sparked by a discussion about the Cameroonian intellectual Achille Mbembe, his position toward the State of Israel, and his involvement with the BDS movement, before continuing on to a discussion about Michael Rothberg's book Multidirectional Memory when it was published in a German translation. Finally, the debates deepened with the controversy surrounding Dirk Moses's polemics concerning an ostensible “German catechism” with regard to Holocaust commemoration.