Welcome to the website of the Center for Advanced Genocide Research. Since our founding, we have established ourselves as a major interdisciplinary hub for Holocaust and genocide studies worldwide.
Founded in April 2014, when USC Shoah Foundation commemorated its 20th anniversary, the Center has now grown to include three staff members dedicated to improving access to the Visual History Archive for scholars, centralizing the research being done within the Institute and promoting innovative interdisciplinary research on genocide.
We bring intriguing and creative research to the USC campus from multiple disciplines by offering competitive short- and long-term international fellowships for young and senior scholars. Since 2014, we have already hosted over a dozen fellows from Australia, Russia, Germany and the United States, working in fields as diverse as history, social health and anthropology.
Exciting interdisciplinary and innovative scholarship, from studies on ritualcide during the Cambodian genocide to work with testimonies exploring photography of the ghettoization in occupied Poland during the Holcoaust, has already emerged from researchers’ time at the Center and we are looking forward to seeing more in the near future.
In addition to hosting visiting scholars, bestowing fellowships at USC and internationally, and organizing academic events, the Center is actively developing its own research programs so that it not only supports the great ideas of others, but also actively contributes to advancing Holocaust and genocide studies.
We are in the unique position to develop innovative research programs in real time and in close conjunction with USC Shoah Foundation and its partners as they pursue the collections of new survivor testimonies in several countries – for instance in Guatemala. Thus, we hope that the Center’s research programs will make significant contributions to the advancement of genocide studies.
Wolf Gruner
Shapell-Guerin Chair in Jewish Studies
Professor of History
Founding Director, USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research