REFLECTING ON HISTORY
Skidmore students remember 30th anniversary of Berlin Wall destruction
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. >> The Skidmore College community took a moment to reflect and think as they tore down their reconstruction of the Berlin Wall.
Saturday marked the 30th anniversary of the historical wall’s destruction, at last reunifying the capital city of Germany. Skidmore faculty Petra Watzke and Garett Wilson used the occasion as a chance for students to explore the concept of walls as borders across the globe.
The Skidmore wall reconstruction was 28 feet long and 9 feet high, cutting through a major pedestrian path on campus. It took about 2 weeks to complete and stood on the campus for 10 days. It was built as part of Watzke’s course, “The Berlin Wall,” which explores the significance of the wall in German and global history.
“It was really fun,” said junior student Eleyna Scarbro. “Building the wall was specifically why
I took this class. It wasn’t what I expected.”
Watzke hoped that through her course and the wall project, students would come to understand the divisions, both physical and mental, that walls create.
“This wall was a visible obstruction that all members of the Skidmore campus were affected by and could interact with,” she said, noting that anyone wanting to get through that part of campus would have to go around it or find another path.
Watzke, a visiting assistant professor of German, grew up in Iron Curtuan Germany. She was six years old when the wall fell, an event that she described as “a joyous occasion.” The wall’s destruction allowed her to finally visit family on the other side of the city.
She got the idea for the class and the project while teaching another class, where she casually mentioned remembering the Berlin Wall falling. She overheard students in the back of the room whispering, “oh my god, she was alive when the wall fell!” and realized that today’s students don’t have any memories of the event.
“I wanted them to learn about it firsthand,” she said.
The project was backed by Skidmore’s IdeaLab, which “supports experimental approaches to learning and encourages Skidmore faculty to incorporate skills associated with collaboratively turning ideas into actual creations.”
The IdeaLab teamed Watzke up with Wilson, artistic director in the Department of Theater, and with help from their students, the pair made the wall happen.
While the wall reconstruction was up, everyone on campus was encouraged to write a message on it — Skidmore’s version of the graffiti on the real Berlin Wall.
“I was really surprised by how much people wrote on it,” admitted Scarbro. “I thought people would be annoyed by it or ignore it, but they posted on social media, there were memes about it, it was really popular.”
This experience was an example of Skidmore College’s signature integrative learning, in which students not only read about history but learn about it through a hands-on approach that crosses multiple disciplines.
The project also caught the attention of the local community. Jeff Klembczyk, who lives near Skidmore, found out about the wall reconstruction and came out to see it get knocked down.
“I was in Berlin before and after the wall fell,” he said. “It was my first job out of college. This was a very nostalgic experience for me. The wall started out as something that was so scary with lots of cops, and then it came down and it turned into the biggest party spot.”
“Now that the wall is down, it feels good, because that’s what should happen with walls,” Watzke commented. “Walls don’t solve problems, they create them.”
Moving forward, Watzke is going to teach a senior seminar in the spring entitled “Democracy in the Weimar Republic,” focusing on Germany’s history from 19191933. She is also looking forward to her usual summer trip to Berlin, to do research and visit family. She would be willing to teach her “Berlin Wall” class again, but not right away.
“I was thinking about it, maybe in ten years. You have to have some time in between, otherwise it has no meaning,” she commented. As part of Watzke’s “Berlin Wall” course, other Skidmore faculty members have offered perspectives on walls and barriers in other locations, such as Northern Ireland, the Korean peninsula, the U.S. border with Mexico, China, and the West Bank.
There will also be a roundtable discussion, “The Human Cost of Border Walls,” on Nov. 14. at the college.