My name is Dr. David Hamann; I am a historian based in Berlin and an expert in archival research, specialising in Nazi history. You can read about how I came to be in this field here – below you will find a summary of the key stages of my academic and professional career, as well as a list of my publications.
Why did I become a historian?
I suppose my passion for the past is simply in my blood. At primary school, it was the Romans; at the start of secondary school, it was knights; and since I reached sixth form, I have been fascinated by the political and social upheavals of the 19th and 20th centuries. Exploring and analysing history, particularly by working closely with primary sources, and making the connections clear to others, is something that never ceases to fascinate me. They say you shouldn’t turn your hobby into a career – but fortunately, I have plenty of others as well.
How did the focus on Nazi research come about?
Human, political, cultural, psychological, criminological, philosophical – the crimes of National Socialism were unique in their scale and perfidy. At the same time, much of it has been extensively documented thanks to the bureaucratic apparatus of the Nazi state. This allows the Nazi era to be studied from a variety of perspectives. It is my deep conviction that we have a great responsibility to learn all the lessons from the past in order to prevent a future repetition of such horrors at all costs. In this field, my personal disposition and my responsibility as a human being thus converge.
Academic career
2024: PhD (Dr. phil.) at the Free University of Berlin, topic: The organized solidarity of German Jews for European Jewish Transmigrants in the Crisis year 1881/82.
2011: Magister Artium (M.A.) at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, topic: Gunther Ipsen in Leipzig. The personal and academic biography of a ‘German sociologist’, 1919–1933.
2006: B.A. at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum, topic: The trial against Socrates.
Scholarships and awards
2014 – 2016: PhD scholarship from the German National Academic Foundation.
2015: Research grant from the German Historical Institute (DHI) in Moscow; research for the doctoral thesis at the Russian State Military Archive/Special Archive.
2013 – 2014: Scholarship of the Leo Baeck Fellowship Programme.
2012: Recipient of the Agricultural History Encouragement Award (presented by the Working Group for Agricultural History) for the Master’s thesis.
Career history (selection)
You can find a detailed list of my references here
or on the Recherche-Dienste LinkedIn profile.
Since 2024: Historian at the Berlin cooperative SMartDe eG.
Since 2009: Freelancing historian.
2019-2020: Research assistant at the Moses Mendelssohn Zentrum für europäisch-jüdische Studien (MMZ).
2010-2013: Research assistant of the project “Jewish Migration and Integration in Vienna and Berlin, 1867/71–1918” at the Institute of Economic and Social History at the University of Vienna.
2009: Freelancer at the National Archives of Finland for the project „The National Archives on interned German and Hungarian citizens in Finland in the period of 1944-47“.
2007: Freelancer at the Stiftung Sozialgeschichte des 20. Jahrhunderts. Research into the Reemtsma Group and forced labour in Crimea during the German occupation.
2006-2009: Student assistant at the Zentrum für Antisemitismusforschung (ZfA), Technische Universität Berlin.
2004: Student assistant at the Zentralinstitut für Fernstudienforschung (ZIFF), Fernuniversität Hagen.
Publications (selection)
Books
Ein Billett von Brody über Berlin nach New York. Die organisierte Solidarität deutscher Juden für osteuropäische jüdische TransmigrantInnen im Krisenjahr 1881/82 (= Bd. 67 der Reihe „Europäisch-Jüdische Studien – Beiträge“, hg. vom Moses Mendelssohn Zentrum für europäisch-Jüdische Studien), Berlin/Boston 2023.
Gunther Ipsen in Leipzig. Die wissenschaftliche Biographie eines “Deutschen Soziologen” 1919-1933, Frankfurt am Main 2013.
Deutschsprachige Zionismen. Verfechter, Kritiker und Gegner, Organisationen und Medien (1890-1938), (mit Lisa Sophie Gebhard) Berlin 2019.
Handbuch der völkischen Wissenschaften. Personen – Institutionen – Forschungsprogramme – Stiftungen, herausgegeben von Michael Fahlbusch, Ingo Haar, Alexander Pinwinkler, unter Mitarbeit von David Hamann, 2 Bände, Berlin 2017.
Essays
Organized Jewish Transit through the German Empire and the invention of the “undesirable” Jewish Immigrant, in: Non-Privileged Migration and Mobility Control in the Age of Global Empires: Constructing the ‘Undesirable’ Migrant.(erscheint demnächst).
Paul Nathan. Demokratie und Menschenrechte als Pfeiler moderner Sozialpolitik, published in April 2022 on FEShistory. Printed version: Jacob Hirsch, Jüdische Menschen in der Arbeiterbewegung. Porträts – Debatten – Motive (= Beiträge aus dem Archiv der sozialen Demokratie, Heft 18), 2023, S. 23-28.
„Hand in Hand“ in gegenseitiger Abneigung. Zum ambivalenten Verhältnis des Hilfsvereins der deutschen Juden zur zionistischen Bewegung vor dem Ersten Weltkrieg, in: Lisa Sophie Gebhardt, David Hamann (Hgg.), Deutschsprachige Zionismen, Bern 2019, S. 43-58.
Jüdische Selbstorganisation und Abwehrarbeit in Berlin am Beispiel ost- und südosteuropäischer Migration (1880-1893), in: Medaon. Magazin für jüdisches Leben in Forschung und Bildung, 13 (2019), 25.
Von Hamburg in die Welt. Jüdische Auswanderung und der Hilfsverein der deutschen Juden, 2016, Teil der Hamburger Schlüsseldokumente zur deutsch-jüdischen Geschichte.
Migration organisieren. Paul Nathan und der Hilfsverein der deutschen Juden (1881–1914/18), in: Kalonymos 19 (2016), 2, S. 6-10.
Gunther Ipsen und die völkische Realsoziologie, in: Michael Fahlbusch/Ingo Haar (Hg.), Wissenschaftliche Expertise und Politikberatung, völkische Wissenschaften und Praxis, Paderborn 2010, S. 177-198.
Memberships
Arbeitskreis Geschichte der Jüdischen Wohlfahrt in Deutschland.
Assoziiertes Mitglied des Selma Stern Zentrums für Jüdische Studien Berlin-Brandenburg.
Centralverein.net. Forschungsnetzwerk zum Centralverein deutscher Staatsbürger jüdischen Glaubens (C.V.).