I much enjoyed my stay at the USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research in early March, just before the pandemic turned all of our lives upside down. Meeting the wonderful members of the staff and seeing how much the operations of both the Foundation and the Center have grown since my last visit in 2014 were remarkable experiences.

I had the opportunity to research the USC Shoah Foundation's Visual History Archive this past summer thanks to the Beth and Arthur Lev Student Research Fellowship. I was initially introduced to the archive through a course taught by Dr. Maria Zalewska in the School of Cinematic Arts entitled “Meme, Myself and I: How We Remember in the Digital Age.” Prior to the course, I was unaware of this resource at USC despite having a visual art practice deeply engaged with Holocaust remembrance and archives.

Presented by The Miller Center for Community Protection & Resilience, Rutgers University, International March of the Living and Maimonides Institute for Medicine, Ethics and the Holocaust, in cooperation with USC Shoah Foundation.

It was 83 years ago this week that 13-year-old Lisa Jura boarded a Kindertransport train from Vienna to London, the first step in a journey that would be memorably depicted by her daughter Mona Golabek in the acclaimed The Children of Willesden Lane books. A series of rescue efforts organized by Sir Nicholas Winton, the Kindertransport helped nearly 10,000 Jewish children escape from Germany, Austria, and Czechoslovakia to safety in the United Kingdom.

High school teacher Peter Cook discusses the importance of character education, and putting "culture before content," in today's classrooms.

Yevnigue Salibian is one of the few remaining survivors of the Armenian Genocide, and one of last to provide testimony of that event for the USC Shoah Foundation. She was just a baby when the atrocity began, but has clear recollections of events that lasted into the early 1920s.

The fourth cohort of Teaching with Testimony in the 21st Century in Poland met last week for their initial training on using testimony in their classrooms.

Never forget. Never again. These are common phrases used in Holocaust and genocide education. These are important statements especially when they evoke the real reason to study, learn, and teach about genocide. We must bring this content to students to empower them and encourage them to see beyond themselves. If done right, students become aware of the steps that lead to such atrocities. Teaching about genocide is the only way to have a lasting impact on our students, to affect their worldview, to help them understand that they can make a difference.

Cosponsored by The SCA Alumni Screening Series, USC Institute of Armenian Studies and The Center for Advanced Genocide Research at the USC Shoah Foundation Directed by SCA Alumna Naré Mkrtchyan Produced by Naré Mkrtchyan and Rob Fried Followed by a Q&A with Naré Mkrtchyan 7:30 P.M. on Thursday, September 1st, 2016 The Ray Stark Family Theatre, SCA 108 900 W. 34th Street, Los Angeles, CA 90007 FREE ADMISSION. OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. RSVPs REQUIRED.

With a focus on our first-ever podcast, We Share The Same Sky, join us for a conversation of the digital impacts of testimony, featuring We Share the Same Sky producer Rachael Cerrotti.

On April 20, at Los Angeles City Hall, Councilmember Paul Krekorian, together with co-host Councilmember Eric Garcetti, recognized the USC Shoah Foundation Institute and the Armenian Film Foundation for working jointly to preserve memories of survivors and other witnesses of the Armenian Genocide.

In the Video Activity 1936 Olympic Athletes: Competing and Inspiring students will examine the issue of civil rights and the presence of racism in society through the lens of the 1936 Berlin Olympics.

Middle school can be complicated. As students, we are preparing to go into high school, making new friends, going to our first dances, and unfortunately for too many of us having to deal with constant bullying. While there are those who might be the perpetrators and victims, there are many of us who are the bystanders and it is our duty to stand up against any form of discrimination. I learned through Holocaust survivor testimony that there are many ways to stand up for others.

USC Shoah Foundation is saddened to learn about the passing of Max Glauben, a child survivor of the Warsaw Ghetto, the Majdanek and Dachau concentration camps, and a veteran of the United States Army. In 2018, Max was interviewed by USC Shoah Foundation, in association with the Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum—a center he helped found—for the interactive Dimensions in Testimony exhibit. He recorded his original video testimony for USC Shoah Foundation in Dallas, Texas in 1996.

As a novelist, I am fascinated by decisions. Choice, real or imagined, is what separates tragedy from mythology. Decisions, always made with incomplete understanding, shape the arc of lives and narrative.

In this blog, the Center's 2022-2023 Greenberg Research Fellow Raíssa Alonso reflects on resistance and the roots of her research. 

As the first anniversary of my life-changing trip to Poland is upon me, I take time to reflect on the impact that trip has made on me both personally and professionally.  I have learned so much from my experiences as a teacher in USC Shoah Foundation’s and Discovery Education’s Auschwitz: The Past is Present program.

Steven Spielberg’s Seven-Time Academy Award®-Winning Masterpiece Arrives in Theaters for a Limited Theatrical Engagement. USC Shoah Foundation is Coordinating Free Screenings for High School Educators and Students in Select North American Theaters on Dec. 4 and 5.

“Challenging the Shame Paradigm: Jewish Women’s Narratives of Sexual(ized) Violence During the Holocaust” Lauren Cantillon (PhD candidate in the Department of Culture, Media & Creative Industries at King’s College London, UK) 2020-2021 Robert J. Katz Research Fellow in Genocide Studies March 25, 2021

When Zuzanna Surowy needed to make herself cry as the lead actress in the Holocaust-era feature film My Name Is Sara, she followed the advice of her co-star to “put a demon inside of her” – to imagine something so tragic it would bring tears to her eyes. It was much harder for Surowy, then 15, to follow the second half of that directive: to leave the demon on the set.

Close and distant readings of the Visual History Archive by Todd Presner, professor of Germanic languages, comparative literature, and Jewish Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, for the Spring 2014 issue of PastForward.

In this lecture, Alan Rosen considers the special manner of witness found in Holocaust-era calendars composed in ghettos, in camps, and in hiding. The marking of fast days and festivals tell a remarkable story; the form, organization, and languages of the calendars convey a related one. And as with testimony in general, what is omitted—a date or a month, a name or a script—speaks volumes. At times, moreover, such calendars served as vehicles for sacred writings, images and symbols as well as for camouflaged defiance. The lecture is based on his recent book The Holocaust’s Jewish Calendars: Keeping Time Sacred, Making Time Holy.

First-person testimonial of the Holocaust, co-created by United Nations senior creative advisor Gabo Arora and produced by executive director of USC Shoah Foundation, Stephen Smith, is an official selection of festival’s Tribeca Immersive, in Storyscapes, presented by AT&T, April 21-29, 2017.

Public visits to USC Shoah Foundation give guests a chance to explore the life stories of survivors and witnesses to genocide preserved in the Visual History Archive, and how testimony is used to overcome prejudice, intolerance and hatred.Description:

Monika Koszynska, the USC Shoah Foundation’s regional coordinator in Poland, has been appointed as Chief Specialist in Education at the newly inaugurated Museum of the History of Polish Jews.

You’re invited to the USC Shoah Foundation! Free and open to the public, our monthly tours give visitors a chance to explore the life stories of survivors and witnesses of the Holocaust and other genocides and to discover how their memories are being used to overcome prejudice, intolerance, and bigotry.

Ten Rwandan testimonies from USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive are the latest additions to IWitness, USC Shoah Foundation’s interactive educational website.

USC Shoah Foundation – The Institute for Visual History and Education brought its series of events for Genocide Awareness Week to a close on Thursday, April 11, 2013 with a screening and discussion with filmmaker Elida Schogt.

KGMC staff members held panel discussion.

On January 27, 2011, Anna Lenchovska, the Institute’s regional coordinator in Ukraine takes part in a round table, “Ukrainian society and Holocaust remembrance: research and educational aspects,” at the Diplomatic Academy of Ukraine.