Elke Gryglewski

Elke Gryglewski (born 1965) is a German political scientist and history education expert. In 2021, she was named managing director of the Lower Saxony Memorials Foundation and director of the Bergen-Belsen Memorial. Her research focuses primarily on National Socialism after 1945 and how far-right totalitarian ideology has been dealt with in a diverse German society.

Biography From 1989 to 1995, Gryglewski studied political science at LMU Munich, the Free University of Berlin, and the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences in Santiago, Chile.

From 1995 to 2015, she was a researcher and educator and from 2015 to 2020, deputy director and head of the House of the Wannsee Conference memorial and educational site. "For the survivors, the suffering often didn't end because they only realized afterward that their families had all been murdered, that they no longer had a home. These traumas of what they experienced extend into the fourth generation. That is to say, the suffering has been passed down, in a sense. We know today that even in the families of the perpetrators, psychological consequences persist into the fourth generation." A German-Chilean government commission decided to establish a memorial on the site of this settlement. Four experts from Germany and Chile were tasked with developing the design of this memorial and the history of Colonia Dignidad. Gryglewski and Jens-Christian Wagner from the German Foreign Office were appointed to represent Germany on this commission. A concept was presented in June 2021, but as of 2025, the memorial had not yet been established.

Selected publications Gryglewski, Elke. "Teaching about the Holocaust in multicultural societies: Appreciating the learner." Intercultural Education 21, no. S1 (2010): S41-S49. Gryglewski, Elke: Recognition and Remembrance. Approaches of Arab-Palestinian and Turkish Berlin Youth to the Holocaust, Berlin 2013. Gryglewski, Elke. "Remembrance pedagogy in a migration society." Political education after Auschwitz. Remembrance work and remembrance culture today (2015): 78–90. Gryglewski, Elke. "Didactic approaches to memorial site work in a diverse society." Education and Upbringing 73, no. 3 (2020): 259–272.