Hitler Youth and Bdm: Year 9 Project

By ilham Mukhtar

Introduction

Germany was left in an awful state after World War One. Suffering from the depression, having extremely high unemployment rates, street battles against communism, and occupation in most of its territories- the German Youth Movement went through a revival and many new youth groups were formed. Some of them were similar to our modern boy scouts, while others were nature or hiking clubs.

Youth Groups played an important role in the National-Sozialistische Deutsche Arbeiter Partei (NSDAP), the Nazi party, as well. The Hitler Jugend, Hitler Youth, became active as early as 1923 it started out with few members but as the time passed by they soon gained popularity and their numbers grew. After their male counterparts began to get organized, female groups soon followed. Once female groups started forming, they became known as Hitlerjugend Schwesternschaften, or Hitler Youth Sisterhoods.

The male Hitler Jugend was officially founded as the party's youth organization at the 1926 party congress (14th July), the National Party Day. The League of German Maidens, Bund Deutscher Maedel (BDM), meanwhile, remained widely overlooked. It was founded in 1930 and became the official part of Hitler Jugend in 1932. Although it was now active and the activities conducted were attractive to the young females, membership was much lower