International educators discuss testimony-based educationA conversation with Werner Dreier, Alice Herscovitch, and Karen PolakBy Kori Street

During the weekend of October 10-11, the University of Southern California gathered international academics, musicians and members of the Los Angeles community for a symposium and series of events, collectively called Singing in the Lion’s Mouth: Music as Resistance to Genocide. Hosted by Professor Wolf Gruner of the USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research, and Professor Nick Strimple of the USC Thornton School of Music, the symposium, film screening and concert were also sponsored by USC’s Vision and Voices arts and humanities initiative. The following paragraphs are a reflection on the individual events that made up the weekend, and an exploration into the larger ideas raised in discussions over the course of the weekend.

USC Shoah Foundation staff are currently in Nanjing, China, to record about 20 more testimonies of Nanjing Massacre survivors.

The Genocide Education Project will host a workshop for educators on how to incorporate testimony from Armenian Genocide survivors into their teaching at an event on Friday.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Feb. 11, 2025) — The USC Shoah Foundation announced the appointment of Dr. Brian Hughes as the inaugural Director of its Countering Antisemitism Laboratory, marking a significant expansion of the institute's mission to combat hatred through research, education and action.

Four researchers who are part of the Holocaust Geographies Collaborative explored the Visual History Archive for the first time and were inspired by what they found.

Robert J. Katz, one of USC Shoah Foundation’s most dedicated and long-term supporters, has announced his retirement from USC Shoah Foundation’s Board of Councilors, and that he will remain chair emeritus on the board for the next three years.

Echoes and Reflections—a multimedia curriculum on the Holocaust (www.echoesandreflections.org) is the result of an unprecedented partnership, combining the national outreach network of the Anti-Defamation League, the unmatched visual history resources of the Shoah Foundation, and the historical expertise of Yad Vashem. The pedagogical experience of the three organizations produced the most comprehensive curriculum on the Holocaust available to date.

The ‘Third Workshop for Advanced PhD Candidates from North American Universities and Israel who are working on the Holocaust’, co-sponsored by the USC Shoah Foundation Center For Advanced Genocide Research and Yad Vashem, took place from June 25 to June 29, 2017 at the International Institute for Holocaust Research in Yad Vashem.

I recently returned to China to record audio-visual testimonies from survivors of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre. In February 2014, the Institute incorporated 12 Nanjing testimonies into its Visual History Archive, adding a new perspective to the 53,000 testimonies that we collected from the Holocaust and the Rwandan Tutsi Genocide.

Sally (Fink) Singer still cries over the spilled milk. Yes, it happened more than 80 years ago. And at the age of 100, Sally knows that her siblings – Anne (99), Sol (97), and Ruth (95), who to this day remain inseparable – have long since forgiven her. But the pangs of guilt and hunger linger.

Stephen Feinberg remembers always finding the study of history to be interesting and exciting. During his studies as an undergraduate and graduate student, he was introduced to the history of the Holocaust. “I became increasingly aware that this was a watershed event in history,” he recalls. “Therefore, I felt that it should be taught in schools.”

When I was a child, my grandfather often told me about the Second World War. While he sat next to me, coloring or teaching me letters of the alphabet, he would sneak in a story about his days in the Soviet army. He would tell me about his post as a commander of a marine unit and how his forces liberated an Austrian town under Nazi occupation.

A daughter discovers her father’s secret past and shares his story with the world.

The USC Shoah Foundation mourns the passing of Damas Gisimba, the director of a Kigali orphanage who sheltered and saved the lives of over 400 people, mostly children, during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. Later in life, he headed the Gisimba Memorial Center, a charitable organization that provided after-school programs for disadvantaged children and served as a place of remembrance for victims of the genocide.

Max Glauben was 13 when his family’s apartment was destroyed in the historic battle of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Eva Kuper was 2 when her mother’s cousin rescued her from a train in the frantic moments before it headed to the Treblinka death camp. Both lost parents and other relatives in the Holocaust. And both are among the four Holocaust survivors whose testimonies USC Shoah Foundation is recording this week using cutting-edge, 360-degree filming techniques at the physical locations of their pre-war and wartime experiences, as well as their places of liberation.

Part of a series that will examine genocide and the law, this moderated discussion will explore why eyewitness testimony matters in preventing genocide. USC Shoah Foundation Finci-Viterbi Executive Director Stephen Smith will lead the conversation with witnesses and experts in the field to tackle this urgent challenge from multiple perspectives.

Six months after it launched, the online guest book has gathered a remarkable collection of messages from people who have been affected by testimony. All are encouraged to sign the guest book until Dec. 31, 2014.

A distinguished voice of history has been lost today in the passing of Auschwitz survivor Roman Kent, who captured the agony of the Holocaust and the power of love in his telling of a simple story about his childhood dog, Lala. Kent was 92.

The university celebrated Shapiro’s gift at an event outside Leavey Library on USC’s University Park Campus, the home of the USC Shoah Foundation. As part of the gift, the foundation’s space at the library has been renamed the Mickey Shapiro Headquarters of the USC Shoah Foundation.

A public lecture by Clara Dijkstra (PhD candidate in History, University of Cambridge, Christ’s College) 2023-2024 USC Shoah Foundation Robert J. Katz Research Fellow in Genocide Studies (Join us in person for this lecture or attend virtually on Zoom)

Steve's passion for fighting antisemitism and educating the next generation led him to join the Board of Councilors in 1997 when the organization was in its infancy. He has remained committed to our mission, serving as Chair of the Board of Councilors from 2015 to 2019.

Presented as part of USC’s Genocide Awareness Week, three events organized by the USC Shoah Foundation will explore artistic responses to genocide, highlighting the ability of creative expression to shine light in the darkness and give voice to silence. The events will reveal the power of the arts to communicate messages of survival and hope in the face of great tragedy. The series is sponsored by the USC Visions and Voices initiative.

Students and faculty have three unique and exciting opportunities to get involved with USC Shoah Foundation beginning this summer.

Professor Jan Grabowski, a distinguished scholar of the Holocaust in Poland will serve as the 2022-2023 Sara and Asa Shapiro Scholar in Residence at the USC Dornsife Center for Advanced Genocide Research and USC Shoah Foundation. He will deliver the Annual Sara and Asa Shapiro Lecture, entitled "Holocaust in Poland: New Research, New Findings", and spend a week in residence at the Center and USC Shoah Foundation in March 2023.

Professor Jan Grabowski, a distinguished scholar of the Holocaust in Poland will serve as the 2022-2023 Sara and Asa Shapiro Scholar in Residence at the USC Dornsife Center for Advanced Genocide Research and USC Shoah Foundation. He will deliver the Annual Sara and Asa Shapiro Lecture, entitled "Holocaust in Poland: New Research, New Findings", and spend a week in residence at the Center and USC Shoah Foundation in March 2023.

Launch event to be held on campus.

This week, more than 20,000 people will attend Liberation 75, a virtual, global gathering for Holocaust survivors, their descendants, scholars, educators, and the wider community. The online conference, taking place May 4 to 9, is cosponsored by more than 200 organizations, including USC Shoah Foundation.

East Coast dance artist Rachel Linsky combines movement and testimony to create a novel form of Holocaust education.  Rachel directs and choreographs ZACHOR, an initiative that honors Holocaust survivors through dance. Her latest work in the project is Hidden, a dance film and production based on the story of Aaron Elster, a Jewish boy who from 1943 to 1945 hid from Nazi persecution in the attic of a Polish family. 

USC Shoah Foundation on Monday Mar. 27 and on Friday Mar. 31 celebrated the completion of a years-long endeavor to integrate hundreds of testimonies from the Armenian Genocide into the Visual History Archive.