Residential Child Care in Special Homes in the GDR - A pedagogical-reconstructive study on the GDR educational system and coping mechanisms

A research Association of Technische Universität Dresden and the memorial Juvenile Work and Detention Center Torgau

The research association Special Homes in the GDR (short title DDR-Spezialheime) is one of 14 funded research associations throughout Germany under the Guideline for the Promotion of Research Projects in the Field of GDR Research in the Framework Programme Humanities, Cultural Studies and Social Sciences of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) for the sustainable anchoring of knowledge about GDR and SED injustice.

A quarter of all GDR home children between 1949 and 1989/90 were accommodated in special homes (Spezialheim), especially in special children's homes (Spezialkinderheim) or juvenile work and detention centers (Jugendwerkhof). Both their personal experiences and the structures of the GDR home education as a whole have hardly been taken into account and/or noticed for a long time after the reunification of the two German states. It has only been more recently that the public discourse about the injustice suffered in GDR special homes and about rehabilitation or compensation payments for former inmates has led to increased attention, also from the academic world.

Involving witnesses of the time, the research association aims to contribute to an in-depth research and a better understanding of this history. Furthermore, it is a main objective of the association to make the knowledge about GDR home education accessible, to sustainably impart it, and to anchor it in academic research and teaching. It is envisaged to develop a biographical database as well as training and teaching material, to hold conferences, and to issue publications. The long-term aim is to establish a cooperation network between higher education and historical-political education.

The team of the research association includes educationalists and historians from both partners who have several years of research experience and expertise in the field of GDR reappraisal as well as in counselling for those affected.

Looking for witnesses of the time

The research association analyses youth welfare and home files, pedagogical publications, research literature, and biographical self-reports. Interviews with witnesses of the time provide the fundamental basis, as personal experiences must be understood as a key to understanding the system of GDR home education, its effects and implications, and how people have coped with it. This knowledge will be prepared and used for educational and teaching material as well as for a biographical database. That is why we ask for your help:

We are looking for witnesses of the time for interviews with the members of the research association.

You yourself have been accommodated in a GDR juvenile work and detention center, a special children's home, the GJWH Torgau or a transit home and would be willing to tell your life story, or you have personal documents from your time in the home? The members of the research association GDR Special Homes ask for your help in researching the GDR home system. Any interviews with the association's members, their analysis, and the presentation of the results will, of course, be anonymous. If you agree and wish, your story can also be included in the biographical database of the Memorial Juvenile Work and Detention Center Torgau and help to document the history of GDR homes.

You have experienced special homes in GDR times as a parent of a home child, as an employee in the pedagogical environment, as a staff member in the environment of the school or of youth welfare, as a resident of the neighborhood of such an institution? Or you are in possession of materials and/or files from special homes?
The members of the research association ask for your help in researching the GDR special home system. All interviews, their analysis, and the presentation of results are, of course, anonymous.

Contact:

Information for interested individuals and researchers

The research association conducts research into home education in the GDR, with a special focus on special homes (Spezialheime) (special children's homes Spezialkinderheime, transit homes Durchgangsheime, juvenile work and detention centres Jugendwerkhöfe, including the GJWH Torgau and the special homes for psychodiagnostics Kombinat der Sonderheime für Psychodiagnostik). In order to gain more differentiated insights into the complex subject of GDR home education, the project considers the perspectives of former home children and adolescents and their relatives as well as of former employees in the context of theses institutions. At the same time, the reconstruction of the logic and structure of the institution special home (Spezialheim) is an additional focus of the study.
The main aim of the research association is to anchor the accumulated knowledge on GDR home education in academic research and teaching in a more permanent way than before. This includes its implementation not only in research and teaching at universities, but also with the responsible bodies for the political education of young people, making the topic more widely known to the general public.

In order to systematically address the issue of upbringing in special homes in the GDR, the research association is analysing a variety of data, including autobiographical-narrative interviews with witnesses of the time, youth welfare and home files, as well as additional archived documents and literature about special homes in the GDR.