Honors Students Continue Support of Stolpersteine Project Through Southern Miss Germany Study Abroad Program

Fri, 03/28/2025 - 09:51am | By: Dr. David Tisdale

A study abroad program in Germany continues to offer University of Southern Mississippi (USM) honors students the opportunity to see how this consequential European nation celebrates its cultural riches and embraces a bright future while acknowledging a dark past.

The Honors 303 seminar, “Understanding Germany: Then and Now,” explores the ways Germany presents itself to the world and how the world perceives Germany. In the two-week experiential learning trip, students learn about the country’s history and the thinkers, artists, trades, culture, and heritage to which many have never been exposed, followed by a look at the ways Germany has confronted the horrors of its role in the Holocaust and World War II, as well as the difficulties of the Cold War era.

Students visit Hamburg and surrounding towns, exploring the historic Hanseatic League, Hamburg’s world-renowned museums, Christmas markets, and literary figures before traveling to the capital, Berlin. There, they consider how Germany’s past intersects with its present and examine how the country has recognized and memorialized its history. Other sites that make up the program’s itinerary include the remains of the Berlin Wall and the communities, restaurants, and markets that make the city one of Europe’s most global and diverse. The itinerary also features day trips to Lübeck, the Baltic Sea, and Potsdam–often referred to as the “Versailles of Germany.”

This semester, the program and its students renewed their relationship with members of the parish of St. Nikolai church in Hamburg, who partner with the local Stolpersteine group. Stolpersteine, meaning “stumbling stones,” is the title of the commemorative brass plaques created by artist Gunter Demnig that memorialize victims of the Holocaust, which are placed throughout Germany and Europe. Southern Miss students have sponsored six Stolpersteine during the three study abroad group visits to Germany.  

This year, the Southern Miss Honors College sponsored Stolpersteine for two children of forced laborers from Eastern Europe who died in an infamous hospital in Hamburg.

Accompanying the students on the trip were Dr. Joyce Inman, dean of the Honors College; Dr. Sabine Heinhorst, dean emeritus; and Dr. Andrew Haley, associate professor of history.

“I consider one of the highlights of our stay in Hamburg our annual meeting with members of the St. Nikolai Church who are part of the Stolpersteine Initiative,” Heinhorst said. “The presentation by Herr Heinz-Otto Haag [on the project] helps our students understand the importance of remembering Nazi murder victims by name on a ‘stumbling stone’ in front of their last known place of residence. Students feel particularly connected through our annual contribution, which funds two Stolpersteine.”

Honors College students Gracie Singley and Kaleb Favaloro reflected on the powerful impact of the Stolpersteine project and the importance of recognizing and remembering the inhumanity of the past to hopefully prevent it in the future not just in Germany, but throughout the world.   

“It [Stolpersteine initiative] is so powerful because of how personal it makes the devastation of World War II,” Singley said, noting that approximately 11 million people were murdered in the Holocaust in the 1930s-40s at the hands of the Nazi regime under dictator Adolf Hitler. 

“It forces you to confront the fact that each person was an individual who had a home, a family who loved them, and, above all else, dignity. It made me realize that instead of the Holocaust being one big tragedy, it was 11 million individual tragedies that the world will never be able to fully comprehend.”

For Favaloro, the Stolpersteine initiative could be replicated in the U.S. to memorialize victims of oppression and violence. “Those helping in Germany do it because the victims were human just like us,” Favaloro explained. “Those who help the Jews don't have to be Jewish. To recognize the sins of our country's past, we don't have to be personally connected with the victim group–we just have to recognize our shared humanity."  

Dr. Joyce Inman, dean of the Honors College, said the Germany Study Abroad program aligns with a key goal of the college for its students–learning about other cultures and their place in our global community.

“Being a part of the team that brings this interdisciplinary and research-intensive opportunity to our Honors Scholars for the past three years has shaped me as a scholar, a teacher, and an administrator, and I’m grateful to my colleagues and our students for sharing their expertise and their curiosity with me,” Inman reflected. “Southern Miss students impress me more every year as they embrace the challenges of studying abroad and remind me that we are making a difference.”

For more information about the Southern Miss Honors College, visit their website. Learn more about Southern Miss Study Abroad here.