In writing the story of Polish Catholic diplomat Jan Karski, who in 1943 brought eye-witness evidence of Nazi atrocities directly to Western leaders, creators of the play and film "Remember This" had many sources to draw on. But it was Karski’s 1995 interview with the USC Shoah Foundation that was most useful in navigating the intricacies of Karski’s character, providing emotional resonance to the film.

    -   Invitación para presentación de propuestas IX Conferencia Internacional de la INoGS Genocidio y comunidades sobrevivientes: agencia, resistencia, reconocimiento 23-26 de junio de 2024 University of Southern California Los Ángeles En el territorio ancestral y no cedido de las naciones de Tongva y Kizh

Middle and high school students around the world are exploring the themes of resistance, solidarity and resilience using an innovative new film-based curriculum produced by the USC Shoah Foundation and The Ghetto Fighters’ House Museum in Israel, one of the first Holocaust museums in the world. 

USC Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual History and Education is pleased to invite applications from scholars of all levels for its Non-residential Scholar Program. The Program is intended to enable full access to the USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive (VHA) to support scholarly research with survivor testimonies housed in the archive.

With anti-Jewish violence and rhetoric on the rise around the world, the USC Shoah Foundation this fall launches a new Antisemitism Lecture Series where leading scholars will guide audiences through the latest research on this persistent and shapeshifting bigotry.

More than 300 people turned out Wednesday for a public convening at which a high-level panel discussed threats to Holocaust memory caused by growing antisemitism and revisionist campaigns that deny and distort details of the Shoah.

In early September, Clara Dijkstra, a Ph.D. Candidate in History at the University of Cambridge and the 2023-2024 USC Shoah Foundation Robert J. Katz Research Fellow in Genocide Studies, arrived for her monthlong residency at the USC Dornsife Center for Advanced Genocide Research (CAGR) to conduct research in the USC Shoah Foundation's Visual History Archive.

USC Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual History and Education invites applications from graduate students from any university for the 2024-2025 USC Shoah Foundation Robert J. Katz Research Fellowship in Antisemitism Studies.

There are no words that can adequately convey our grief, outrage, and sorrow. The barbaric crimes committed against Israeli civilians this week have shocked us all. As we continue to uncover the brutality of the attacks perpetrated by Hamas, including more than 1,300 murders, untold numbers of those abducted and violated, and the many more who have been traumatized by these crimes, we are deeply concerned for our friends and relatives in danger. Our hearts break for the families who fear for the safety of loved ones, and we grieve alongside those who have experienced unspeakable loss.

Over the past several days, I have been in touch with many members of the Trojan Family who voiced their pain and despair in the wake of the unprecedented terrorist attacks in Israel. We mourn the shocking loss of life. We condemn the terrorist attacks by Hamas and their brutal threats to execute kidnapped civilians and commit other atrocities.

Dear Friends, I am writing to you with profound sorrow. The murderous attack that occurred in Israel was an act of antisemitism in its most depraved form by a genocidal regime in Gaza sponsored by Iran, a country that repeatedly calls for the destruction of Israel. There can be no moral equivalence. “From the river to the sea” has only one meaning–the elimination of Israel. This was a massacre of people for only one reason—they were Jews.

The USC Shoah Foundation is recording testimonies of survivors of the Hamas terror attacks in Israel as part of a major initiative launched days after October 7, when 1,400 people were massacred and some 250 taken hostage.

For more than a year, tensions and fighting in and on the border of the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) have grown in intensity. In part the result of the nature of the region’s creation under the Soviets in the 1920s, this has had a disastrous effect on the 120,000 ethnic Armenians who call Nagorno-Karabakh home.

The Institute mourns the passing of members of our community in 2022, including survivors who have given testimony, Joe Adamson, Helen Fagin, Sigmund Burke, Vera Gissing, Gerda Weissmann Klein, Bill Harvey, Max Glauben, Max Eisen, Phillip Maisel, Edward Mosberg, Judah Samet and Robert Clary.

The USC Shoah Foundation mourns the August 3, 2023 passing of Nimrod “Zigi” Ariav, a Holocaust survivor who fought in the 1944 Warsaw Uprising and Israel’s War of Independence before becoming a leader in the Israeli aeronautics industry. He was a longtime supporter of the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw. He was 96. 

In the moments before Shaylee Atary Winner escaped from her home in the early morning hours of October 7, she saw her husband fighting to close the iron window grates in their safe room over the hand of a terrorist who was reaching in. With a glance, Shaylee and her husband silently agreed she would take their baby and run.

Ben Ferencz, the last remaining prosecutor from the Nuremberg Trials who passed away in Florida earlier this month, gave countless interviews over the course of his illustrious career. But surely none was longer, or more technically challenging, than the three-day testimony he gave to USC Shoah Foundation at the height of the Covid pandemic in July 2020. The need for social distancing necessitated that filming be done remotely, with boxes of sophisticated equipment shipped to Ferencz’s modest Florida home.

We are grateful that so many of these survivors, partners, friends, and family members have entrusted us to share their stories for future generations, and for the passion and dedication they brought in support of our mission.

Gerald Szames is 2, maybe 3 years old. He is standing at the foot of the bed, looking at his mother. She is sick, propped up on a pile of pillows. He has other flashes of memories of life before the Nazis invaded his Polish shtetl of Trochenbrod in 1941, when he was four years old – his grandfather taking him to the mill, his father lifting him up to give him a candy and a kiss.

In October 1942, when deportations from the Warsaw ghetto paused, more than 20 youth groups and underground units coalesced into a united front. Vladka Meed channeled her despair at losing her family into fighting the Nazis.

Beginning November 1, 2022, in observance of Native American Heritage Month in the United States, the USC Dornsife Center for Advanced Genocide Research shared one video per day from our recent international conference "Mass Violence and Its Lasting Impact on Indigenous Peoples - The Case of the Americas and Australia/Pacific Region," which was held at the University of Southern California, on the ancestral and unceded territory of the Tongva and Kizh Nation peoples.

When one works in the field of Holocaust memory, you tend to find that your colleagues are a mission driven, self-effacing, highly dedicated bunch. We work with hard subjects, care deeply and build strong bonds with one another as we cope with the challenging, yet abundantly meaningful work. We were blessed here at USC Shoah Foundation to have formed those strong bonds with the brilliant and compassionate Kia Hays.

USC Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual history and Education embarked on a new chapter on Tuesday when it unveiled its new global headquarters on the USC campus. The event also marked the start of the Institute’s 25th anniversary, a time that will propel its work into new frontiers as it continues its mission of sharing the 55,000 testimonies of survivors of the Holocaust and other genocides to foster empathy and respect.

'Stronger Than Hate @ USC' kicked off the first virtual event in a four-part series confronting hate at USC, past, present, and future.  

Liberation75 and USC Shoah Foundation partnered on a virtual student program, “Stories are Stronger than Hate: A Call to Action,” hosted by actor/director Mike Myers, with special guest Akim Aliu, Co-founder of Hockey Diversity Alliance, on Monday June 22. Through the personal narrative of Holocaust survivor Pinchas Gutter and other stories, participants explored how stories create the possibility to learn about ourselves, about others and about how we can affect the change we want to see in our communities right now.

One morning in 1978, Theary Seng awoke alongside her younger brother in their prison cell in Boeng Rai Security Center, about 100 kilometers south of their hometown of Phnom Penh, Cambodia. The children’s mother had been in the cell the night before, but now she was gone.

Niemand, who was raised in the small town of Linz in Austria, became interested in Holocaust history through the teachings of his mother, a professor of modern history at a local university.

USC Shoah Foundation Managing Director Kim Simon and Director of Education Kori Street are in Bucharest, Romania, this week at the bi-annual plenary meeting of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA).