skip to content
Texas Holocaust and Genocide Commission

Vocabulary: Holocaust

#

  • PLEASE READ THIS NOTE ON VOCABULARY
    This vocabulary section is brand new and not yet complete. We appreciate your patience while definitions are continuously being added. In the meantime, please… [click to read full definition]

A

  • Aktion T-4
    Definition coming soon.
  • Mordechai Anielewicz
    Group portrait of members of the Hashomer Hatzair socialist Zionist youth movement. Pictured in the back row, left to right, are: Tzvi Braun, Shifra… [click to read full definition]
  • Anschluss
    Definition coming soon.
  • antisemitism
    Antisemitism refers to a term first coined in Germany in the nineteenth century. In 2019 the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) developed the following… [click to read full definition]
  • Appellplatz
    Definition coming soon.
  • Arrow Cross
    Arrow Cross refers to the political party that governed Hungary from 1944-1945, having gained power when the Germans intervened to depose Miklós Horthy for… [click to read full definition]
  • Aryan
    Definition coming soon.
  • Ashkenazi
    Ashkenazi refers to an ethnic designation assigned to most of the world's Jewish population. Ashkenazi culture begins with Jews who settled in The Rhineland… [click to read full definition]
  • Attack on the 20th Convoy
    Attack on the 20th Convoy refers to a particular 1943 event involving the rescue of Jews during a train transport from a transit camp… [click to read full definition]
  • Rachel Auerbach
    Yad Vashem, Photo Archive, Jerusalem Rachel Auerbach (also spelled Rokhl Auerbakh, 1903-1976) refers to the survivor of the Warsaw ghetto who, during her time there, played… [click to read full definition]
  • Auschwitz-Birkenau
    Definition coming soon.

B

  • Babyn Yar (Babi Yar)
    Definition coming soon.
  • Samuel Bak
    Samuel Bak refers to the artist, whose paintings explore themes from his experiences as a child survivor of the Vilna Ghetto. Some of his… [click to read full definition]
  • Baltic states
    Definition coming soon.
  • Battle of Stalingrad
    Definition coming soon.
  • Beer Hall Putsch
    Definition coming soon.
  • Bergen-Belsen
    Definition coming soon.
  • Berlin Olympics
    Definition coming soon.
  • Besa (Albania)
    Besa refers to the principle of a binding promise or pledge of honor that is esteemed in Albanian culture. In the Holocaust over 200… [click to read full definition]
  • Bełżec
    Definition coming soon.
  • blood libel
    Linz, Austria, A memorial plate commemorating a blood libel, 1937. | Yad Vashem, Photo Archive, Jerusalem Blood libel refers to the persistent, widespread, false… [click to read full definition]
  • book burning
    Definition coming soon.
  • boycott
    Definition coming soon.
  • Brownshirts
    Definition coming soon.
  • Brundibár
    Definition coming soon.
  • Buchenwald
    Definition coming soon.

C

  • Paul Celan
    Definition coming soon.
  • Le Chambon-sur-Lignon
    Definition coming soon.
  • Chełmno
    Definition coming soon.
  • Churbn
    Churbn refers to the Yiddish term for the Holocaust. It is not often used or understood outside of the Jewish community. Among Jews, it… [click to read full definition]
  • circumcision
    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Mayer & Rachel Abramowitz Circumcision refers to removal of the foreskin of a man or boy. Because Judaism… [click to read full definition]
  • collaborators
    Definition coming soon.
  • communists
    Definition coming soon.
  • concentration camp
    Definition coming soon.
  • Father Charles Coughlin
    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of the Katz FamilyFather Charles Coughlin (1891-1979) refers to the American Catholic priest and leader of the… [click to read full definition]
  • crematoria
    Definition coming soon.

D

  • Dachau
    Definition coming soon.
  • Dearborn Independent
    Definition coming soon.
  • death camp (see killing center)
    Definition coming soon.
  • death march
    Definition coming soon.
  • degenerate art
    Definition coming soon.
  • dehumanization
    Definition coming soon.
  • Charlotte Delbo
    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of an Anonymous Donor Charlotte Delbo (1913-1985) refers to the French literary critic and memoirist whose experience as… [click to read full definition]
  • denazification
    Definition coming soon.
  • deportation
    Definition coming soon.
  • Der ewige Jude
    1940 poster advertises the Nazi anti-Semitic film, “The Eternal Jew.” | German Propaganda Archive Der ewige Jude [The Eternal Jew/The Wandering Jew] refers to… [click to read full definition]
  • Der Giftpilz
    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of the Katz Family Der Giftpilz [The Poisonous Mushroom] refers to the 1938 children's picture book by Ernst Hiemer… [click to read full definition]
  • Der Stürmer
    Poster advertisment for Der Stürmer | United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of the Deutsches Historiches Museum Der Stürmer refers to the antisemitic… [click to read full definition]
  • diaspora
    Definition coming soon.
  • disabled
    Definition coming soon.
  • Displaced Persons camp
    Definition coming soon.
  • Dominican Republic
    Definition coming soon.
  • Georg Duckwitz
    Georg Duckwitz (1904-1973) refers to the German diplomat who secretly warned Danish leaders about the impending roundup of Denmark's Jews. This warning gave the… [click to read full definition]
  • dysentery
    Definition coming soon.

E

  • Einsatzgruppen
    Definition coming soon.
  • Emancipation of the Jews
    Definition coming soon.
  • eugenics
    Definition coming soon.
  • euphemism
    Definition coming soon.
  • Évian Conference
    Definition coming soon.
  • Expulsions of the Jews
    Definition coming soon.
  • extermination
    Definition coming soon.

F

  • fascism
    Definition coming soon.
  • Fania Fénelon
    Definition coming soon.
  • Final Solution
    Definition coming soon.
  • Henry Ford
    Definition coming soon.
  • Anne Frank
    Definition coming soon.
  • Führer
    Definition coming soon.

G

  • gas chamber
    Definition coming soon.
  • General Government
    Definition coming soon.
  • German American Bund
    Definition coming soon.
  • Gestapo
    Definition coming soon.
  • ghetto
    Definition coming soon.
  • Miep Gies
    Definition coming soon.
  • Josef Goebbels
    Definition coming soon.
  • Goldhagen-Browning Debate
    Definition coming soon.
  • Grand Mufti of Jerusalem
    Definition coming soon.
  • Great Depression
    Definition coming soon.
  • Herschel Grynszpan
    Yad Vashem, Photo Archive, Jerusalem Herschel Grynszpan (1921-1945?) refers to the German Jew who assassinated Ernst vom Rath, a German diplomat, in Paris in… [click to read full definition]

H

  • Reinhard Heydrich
    Definition coming soon.
  • Hitler Youth
    Definition coming soon.
  • Adolf Hitler
    Definition coming soon.
  • Holocaust
    The Holocaust refers to the systematic, bureaucratic, state-sponsored persecution and murder of six million Jews by the Nazi regime and its collaborators.  Note: In… [click to read full definition]
  • homosexuals
    Definition coming soon.
  • Miklos Hórthy
    Definition coming soon.

I

  • Italy
    Definition coming soon.

J

  • Jedwabne
    Definition coming soon.
  • Jehovah's Witness
    Definition coming soon.
  • Jewish assimilation
    Definition coming soon.
  • The Jewish Question
    Definition coming soon.
  • Jews
    Definition coming soon.
  • Jud Süß
    Illustrierter Film-Kurier #3130 [1940]: Jud Süß. | German Propaganda Archive Jud Süß refers to the notorious 1940 Nazi German propaganda film that was produced… [click to read full definition]
  • Judenrat
    Definition coming soon.
  • Judenrein
    Definition coming soon.
  • Judensau
    Definition coming soon.

K

  • Kanada
    Kanada refers to the collection of warehouse buildings in Auschwitz that were used to store property confiscated from new arrivals at the camp, who… [click to read full definition]
  • Kapo
    Definition coming soon.
  • Jan Karski
    Definition coming soon.
  • Kielce Pogrom
    Kielce Pogrom refers to the attacks on and murders of dozens of Holocaust survivors in Kielce, Poland on July 4, 1946. The vast majority… [click to read full definition]
  • killing center ("death camp")
    Definition coming soon.
  • Kindertransport
    Definition coming soon.
  • Gerda Weissmann Klein
    Gerda Weissmann Klein (1924-) refers to the Holocaust survivor who became a famous author and speaker, and who is the subject of a documentary… [click to read full definition]
  • klezmer
    Klezmer refers to the musical genre that is traditionally performed and composed by and popular with Ashkenazi (Eastern European) Jewry. A person who performs this music… [click to read full definition]
  • Janusz Korczak
    Definition coming soon.
  • Abba Kovner
    Definition coming soon.
  • Kraków Ghetto
    Definition coming soon.
  • Kristallnacht
    Definition coming soon.

L

  • labor camp
    Definition coming soon.
  • Lebensborn
    Definition coming soon.
  • Lebensraum
    Definition coming soon.
  • Olga Lengyel
    Chicago Review Press; 2nd Edition (August 30, 2005) Olga Lengyel [1908-2001] refers to the Hungarian Jew who survived and wrote about her experiences as… [click to read full definition]
  • Primo Levi
    Definition coming soon.
  • Life Unworthy of Life
    Definition coming soon.
  • liquidation
    Definition coming soon.
  • Łódź Ghetto
    Definition coming soon.
  • Alice Lok Cahana
    Definition coming soon.
  • Karl Lueger
    Yad Vashem, Photo Archive, JerusalemKarl Lueger (1844-1910) refers to the Christian Social Party politician who served as mayor of Vienna, Austria from 1897-1910. Lueger… [click to read full definition]

M

  • Madagascar Plan
    Franz Rademacher, architect of the Madagascar Plan, in 1968. Courtesy of History.com The Madagascar Plan refers to a proposal that the Nazi leadership allegedly… [click to read full definition]
  • Majdanek
    Definition coming soon.
  • Maria Mandel
    Maria Mandel [also spelled Mandl] refers to the Nazi war criminal who was one of the few women to be executed after being captured and tried… [click to read full definition]
  • Wilhelm Marr
    Wilhelm Marr (1819-1904) refers to the German activist and writer who popularized the use of the term, antisemitism, advocated for the expulsion of the Jews, and… [click to read full definition]
  • Mauthausen
    Definition coming soon.
  • medical ethics
    Definition coming soon.
  • Mein Kampf
    Definition coming soon.
  • Mischlinge
    Definition coming soon.
  • Mizrahi
    Definition coming soon.
  • Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
    Definition coming soon.
  • Henry Morgenthau, Jr
    Definition coming soon.
  • MS St. Louis
    Definition coming soon.

N

  • Nazism
    Definition coming soon.
  • Martin Niemöller
    Definition coming soon.
  • Night and Fog
    Night and Fog [Nuit et brouillard] refers to a 1956 French documentary film of 32 minutes by Alain Resnais. The term,  Nacht und Nebel, was originally… [click to read full definition]
  • Night of the Long Knives
    Definition coming soon.
  • North Africa
    Definition coming soon.
  • Norway
    Definition coming soon.
  • Nuremburg Laws
    Definition coming soon.

O

  • Operation Reinhard
    Definition coming soon.
  • Oswego, NY
    Definition coming soon.
  • Zsuzsanna Ozsváth
    Photo courtesy of The University of Texas at DallasZsuzsanna Ozsváth refers to the child Holocaust survivor who became a prominent academic, translator, and author in… [click to read full definition]

P

  • Pale of Settlement
    Definition coming soon.
  • parasite
    Definition coming soon.
  • partisans
    Definition coming soon.
  • perpetrators
    Definition coming soon.
  • phenol injection
    Definition coming soon.
  • pogrom
    Definition coming soon.
  • Poland
    Definition coming soon.
  • political dissidents
    Definition coming soon.

R

  • race theory
    Definition coming soon.
  • Red Army
    Definition coming soon.
  • Reichstag fire
    Definition coming soon.
  • Reischskonkordat
    Definition coming soon.
  • rescue of Albanian Jews
    Definition coming soon.

S

  • Nelly Sachs
    Definition coming soon.
  • Oskar Schindler
    Definition coming soon.
  • Hans and Sophie Scholl
    Definition coming soon.
  • Schutzstaffel
    Definition coming soon.
  • scrip
    Definition coming soon.
  • selection
    Definition coming soon.
  • Irena Sendler
    Definition coming soon.
  • Hannah Senesh
    Definition coming soon.
  • Sephardi
    Definition coming soon.
  • Shanghai
    Definition coming soon.
  • Shoah
    Shoah refers to the Hebrew term for the Holocaust. It is biblical term that denotes destruction. It has gained widespread usage not just among… [click to read full definition]
  • Shoes on the Danube Bank
    Shoes on the Danube Bank refers to sculptor Gyula Pauer's 2005 Budapest memorial to Jewish and other victims of the Arrow Cross who were murdered in… [click to read full definition]
  • Dawid Sierakowiak
    Definition coming soon.
  • Slavs
    Definition coming soon.
  • Sobibór
    Definition coming soon.
  • Sonderkommando
    Definition coming soon.
  • Soviet prisoners of war
    Definition coming soon.
  • stab-in-the-back myth
    The stab-in-the-back myth refers to the lie that Jews conspired to orchestrate the German surrender in WWI, despite Germany's likelihood of winning the war. This… [click to read full definition]
  • Joseph Stalin
    Definition coming soon.
  • sterilization
    Definition coming soon.
  • Julius Streicher
    Definition coming soon.
  • MV Struma
    Definition coming soon.
  • Chiune Sugihara
    Yad Vashem, Photo Archive, Jerusalem Chiune Sugihara (1900-1986) refers to the Japanese diplomat who helped rescue approximately 6,000 European Jews during the Holocaust. As… [click to read full definition]
  • Swastika
    Definition coming soon.

T

  • tattoo
    Definition coming soon.
  • Theresienstadt/Terezín
    Definition coming soon.
  • Sister Rose Thering
    Sister Rose Thering (1920-2006) refers to the American nun who famously campaigned to eliminate antisemitism from the Catholic Church and its teachings. Her research… [click to read full definition]
  • Thessaloniki
    Definition coming soon.
  • Third Reich
    Definition coming soon.
  • Dorothy Thompson
    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration, College Park Dorothy Thompson (1893-1961) refers to the influential American journalist whose… [click to read full definition]
  • torch rally
    Definition coming soon.
  • Treaty of Versailles
    Definition coming soon.
  • Treblinka
    Definition coming soon.
  • trial of Adolf Eichmann
    Definition coming soon.
  • trivialization
    Definition coming soon.
  • typhus
    Definition coming soon.

U

  • Untermenschen
    Definition coming soon.
  • Ustashe
    Definition coming soon.

V

  • Vel d'Hiv Roundup
    Definition coming soon.
  • vermin
    Definition coming soon.
  • Vichy France
    Definition coming soon.
  • Vilnius Ghetto
    Definition coming soon.
  • visa
    Definition coming soon.

W

  • Waffen-SS
    Definition coming soon.
  • Richard Wagner
    Encyclopædia Britannica Richard Wagner (1813-1883) refers to the popular German composer who wrote in support of antisemitic race theories. He is especially known for… [click to read full definition]
  • Wagner-Rogers Bill
    Definition coming soon.
  • Raoul Wallenberg
    Definition coming soon.
  • Wansee Conference
    Definition coming soon.
  • Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
    Definition coming soon.
  • Wehrmacht
    Definition coming soon.
  • Weimar Republic
    Definition coming soon.
  • White Rose
    Definition coming soon.
  • Elie Wiesel
    Definition coming soon.
  • Simon Wiesenthal
    Definition coming soon.
  • World War II
    Definition coming soon.

Y

  • Yad Vashem
    Yad Vashem refers to the museum/memorial to Holocaust victims in Jerusalem, Israel. It is the largest Holocaust museum in the world, maintaining exhibits, artwork… [click to read full definition]
  • yellow star
    Definition coming soon.
  • Yiddish
    Manuscript memoir, in Yiddish, page 18 of 120 pages, describing David Newman's experiences in the Skarżysko-Kamienna forced labor camp in Poland during the German… [click to read full definition]
  • Yom HaShoah
    Yom HaShoah, more formally known as Yom HaZikaron laShoah v’laGevurah (Day of Remembrance for the Holocaust and Heroism), is the day officially designated by… [click to read full definition]
  • Yugoslavia
    Yugoslavia refers to the multi-ethnic country that saw the almost total destruction of its Jewish population during the 1940s in the Holocaust, along with the… [click to read full definition]

Z

  • Mala Zimetbaum
    Yad Vashem, Photo Archive, Jerusalem Mala Zimetbaum (full name Malka Zimetbaum, 1918-1944) refers to the Jewish woman who served as a translator at Auschwitz and… [click to read full definition]
  • Zyklon B
    Yad Vashem, Photo Archive, Jerusalem Zyklon B refers to the cyanide poisonous gas that was utilized to murder over a million people at Nazi… [click to read full definition]