Past Events

Dr. James Waller is the Cohen Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Keene State College (NH). The George and Irina Schaeffer Center for the Study of Genocide, Human Rights and Conflict Prevention is pleased to be hosting an evening with him to discuss his work on how ordinary people commit genocide and how perpetrators step back into the community to try and transform the very societies they once tore apart. 

Dr. Waller has held numerous visiting research professorships, including his current visiting position as Honorary Research Professor in the George J. Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Justice and Security at Queen’s University in Belfast, Northern Ireland.  In the policymaking arena, Waller is also regularly involved, in his role as Director of Academic Programs with the Auschwitz Institute for Peace and Reconciliation (AIPR), as the curriculum developer and lead instructor for the Raphael Lemkin Seminars for Genocide Prevention.  These seminars, held on-site and in conjunction with the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, introduce diplomats and government officials from around the world to issues of genocide warning and prevention.   

Dr. Waller has published twenty-eight articles in peer-reviewed professional journals and contributed twenty chapters in edited books.  The most recent of his four published books is Confronting Evil: Engaging Our Responsibility to Prevent Genocide (Oxford University Press, 2016).  

The George and Irina Schaeffer Center for the Study of Genocide, Human Rights and Conflict Prevention are pleased to host an evening with Sarah Gensburger. Sociologist of memory and historian of the Shoah in Paris, she is one half of the team who created the collection of soundwalks Gens de Paris.

Gens de Paris is a soundwalks collection recounting events that took place on this street corner, in the shade of that tree, in that building over there. Based on the lives of former inhabitants, it tells the stories from their perspectives. It aims to cover all time periods, places and themes, as long as there are characters to bring the past to life and in-depth historical research to give them meaning, situating them in their social context.

Each story is born of a dialogue, precious and unprecedented, between a historian and an author. It thus calls on the imagination and emotion of today’s visitors in order to bring these former Parisians back to life. Available both in French and English, the documentary stories created by Gens de Paris will be eventually available as an app, designed to transform our relationship to the town and its past. 

The first soundwalk produced by Gens de Paris was the winner of the jury special award of the Decibels d’or competition (2016): http://gensdelaseine.com

Each thematic soundwalk will be the object of a public, private or associative partnership, two of the planned projects being on the People of the Second World War and on the Americans in Paris.

At AUP, in addition to presenting the collection Gens de Paris, Sarah Gensburger opened the discussion on how members from the AUP community could be involved in these potential projects of digital humanities, be it by sharing and showcasing their research, looking for new material, translations, by working on IT or sound design.

Fellowships are available to AUP students willing to participate in this research project. For more info, please contact Constance Pâris de Bollardière: cparisdebollardiere [at] aup.edu (cparisdebollardiere[at]aup[dot]edu)

Sarah Gensburger is a researcher at the CNRS. She a sociologist of memory and a historian of the Shoah in Paris. She is the author of Witnessing the Robbing of the Jews. A photographic album, Paris 1940-1944 (Indiana University Press, 2016) and C'étaient des enfants. Déportation et sauvetage des enfants juifs à Paris (Skira-Flammarion, 2012).

The George and Irina Schaeffer Center for the Study of Genocide, Human Rights and Conflict Prevention invites you to attend a presentation by guests Patrice Bensimon and Michał Chojak from Yahad - In Unum. 

 Yahad - In Unum is the world's leading organization on Holocaust field research. Over the course of more than 14 years of investigation in 8 countries, Yahad - In Unum has worked to uncover the Holocaust by bullets: the killings of 2,2 million Jews by the Nazis in Eastern Europe from 1941 to 1944. They have located more than 2000 mass graves of these forgotten Jewish victims and gathered evidence of their massacres. 

 Yahad - In Unum has also developed a scientific methodology after years of archival and field research. This expertise has equipped Yahad - In Unum to investigate several genocides and mass crimes, including the Nazi genocide of the Roma people, the mass crimes committed during the Guatemalan armed conflict, and the genocide of the Yazidis that is being perpetrated today by ISIS. 

 Yahad - In Unum also leads academic courses and seminars around the world to help future generations draw lessons from the Holocaust by Bullets. 

 During the conference, Patrice Bensimon and Michał Chojak will present the specificities of the fieldwork that Yahad leads in Eastern Europe on the Holocaust by Bullets. Yahad's specific methodology highlights the core of the criminal process of the genocide. What does it mean today to lead research on mass crimes, to document a genocide and to collect evidence of mass violence? How can we complete our understanding of Holocaust history to include the killings that were perpetrated 70 years ago across an entire continent? 

Patrice Bensimon serves as Research Director for Yahad - In Unum, he started his studies at university in 1997 in the Slavic department at the Sorbonne. He spent one year in Moscow at the University of People’s Friendship and received his M.A. in Slavic Studies when he returned from Moscow. In 2004-2005, he received a M.A. in Soviet and post-Soviet history; his dissertation topic was “Renewal of Jewish community in post-Soviet Russia”. Currently, he is a Ph.D candidate in history in the department of Jewish studies at EHESS (School of High Social Science Studies) and is writing a thesis on “the Jewish sites of memory in post-Soviet Ukraine". 

Michał Chojak has worked with Yahad - In Unum since 2010, when the organization began its research in Poland. In the past six years, Mr. Chojak has participated in 30 research missions in Eastern Europe and interviewed hundreds of eyewitnesses of the Holocaust by bullets. Deputy Director of Yahad - In Unum Research Center since 2014, he has specialized in the research of the Holocaust in Poland and Lithuania. He is also involved in Yahad - In Unum’s research projects in Guatemala and Iraq. Originally from Poland, Michał Chojak completed his studies at the Université Paris-Sorbonne, receiving a Masters in International Trade and a Masters in European affairs. 

www.yahadinunum.org www.yahadmap.org www.facebook.com/yahadinunum  www.seminaireshoahparballes.wordpress.com 

Cannes winning, Academy Award nominated filmmaker and Cambodian genocide survivor Rithy Panh will present his award winning 2014 film The Missing Picture on Thursday October 27th at 6:30 in Combes 103/104. The screening will be followed by a discussion between Rithy Panh and the audience. The screening and following discussion is open to the public. Please register online before coming.

The Missing Picture is an autobiographical documentary in which Rithy Panh reimagines his childhood under the Khmer Rouge from 1975 to 1979. Through a combination of archival footage and had-sculpted clay figurines, the filmmaker raises questions about memory, history and action.

The Missing Picture was awarded the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes in 2013 and was Cambodia’s selection for the Best Foreign Language Film category at the 2014 Academy Awards.

The George and Irina Schaeffer Center for the Study of Genocide, Human Rights and Conflict Prevention at the American University of Paris invites you to an international conference bringing together prominent scholars, lawyers and jurists to discuss the evolving relationship between the law and genocide since the International Military Tribunals at Nuremberg and Tokyo, and to analyze the search for justice that has unfolded both inside and outside the courtroom since that time. 

Morning Session: Inside the Courtroom
Roundtables: 

“Constructing Law in the International Criminal Courts” “Constructing  Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity”

Afternoon Session: Outside the Courtroom
Roundtables: 

“Memory and the Law” “Seventy Years Since Nuremberg:  A Critical Assessment”

> Download the conference program here

This workshop, organized by the George and Irina Schaeffer Center for the Study of Genocide, Human Rights and Conflict Prevention will provide an introduction to the USC Shoah Foundation Visual History Archive. While familiarizing attendees with the archive’s interface and search engine, the Center for Advanced Genocide Research’s staff Emilie Garrigou-Kempton and USC Professor Colin Keaveney will showcase several examples of how testimonies have been used for innovative teaching by scholars from a wide range of disciplines. This workshop will particularly focus on how to use testimonies in the university classroom and how to encourage students to conduct their own research projects using the VHA. Case studies will show how to successfully integrate testimonies to courses across disciplines. 

Emilie Garrigou-Kempton is the Academic Relations and Outreach officer at the Center for Advanced Genocide Research. A native of France, Emilie Garrigou-Kempton received a B.A. and a M.A. in Philosophy from Bordeaux University and a M.A. in International Development from Lyons University. She worked for several international humanitarian agencies and was an ethics advisor for the Los Angeles Unified School District before obtaining her Ph.D. in French literature and gender studies at USC. 

Colin Keaveney is Associate Professor (Teaching) of French at USC, where he is also co-director of the Francophone Research and Resource Center. He holds degrees from Trinity College (Dublin), the Université de Paris VII and the University of California. He is a fellow of the Shoah Foundation at USC, and his recent teaching relates to testimony and the representation of persecution and genocide, especially the Shoah, in the French-speaking world. Colin has also been a recipient of the USC Provost's Prize for Teaching with Technology for innovations in the area of language instruction and curricular development.

Please RSVP on the sign-up form below:

The George and Irina Schaeffer Center for the Study of Genocide, Human Rights and Conflict Prevention at the American University of Paris invites you to a panel discussion on the nature of the video archives of survivor testimony and how their experience has been archived by different organizations.

Archivists from several critical Holocaust archives (the Visual History Archives at the University of Southern California, the Fortunoff Archives at Yale University, the Hebrew University and Yad Vashem) will give a short presentation of their collections: What is the history of their collection? What influenced their beginnings? What were the methods used in selecting persons for interviews? How were the interviews constructed and carried out? What do the archives emphasize? What are the contents? How do users interact with and approach the archives?

After the presentations, a discussion will follow on Holocaust testimony in comparative perspective.

Participants:

Emilie Garrigou-Kempton is the Academic Relations and Outreach officer at the Center for Advanced Genocide Research. A native of France, Emilie Garrigou-Kempton received a B.A. and a M.A. in Philosophy from Bordeaux University and a M.A. in International Development from Lyons University. She worked for several international humanitarian agencies and was an ethics advisor for the Los Angeles Unified School District before obtaining her Ph.D. in French literature and gender studies at USC. 

Sharon Kangisser Cohen is the Director of the Central Archive of the Jewish People at the National Library of Israel and the Director of the Diane and Eli Zborowski Centre for the Study of the Holocaust and its aftermath at Yad Vashem. She is, in addition, a lecturer at the Rothberg School for international students at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Her most recent book, Testimony and Time: Survivors of the Holocaust Remember, was published in 2015 by Yad Vashem.

Stephen Naron, Director of the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies at Yale University Library. Stephen has worked as an archivist/librarian since 2003, when he received his MSIS from the University of Texas, Austin. He studied Judaistik at the Freie Universitaet Berlin, and History at the Zentrum fuer Antisemitismusforschung, TU. He has a BA in History from the University of Kansas.

Joanne Weiner Rudof is the archivist at the Fortunoff Video Archive for Holocaust Testimonies, Yale University and has been at Fortunoff for over 28 years. She has coordinated over 20 Holocaust testimony projects in North and South America, Europe and Israel. She has written numerous articles, book chapters, and conference papers on Holocaust testimonies and been editor and producer of documentaries, including Voices from the Yugoslav Holocaust, Remembering Częstochowa, Parallel Paths, and the award-winning national PBS broadcast, Witness: Voices from the Holocaust, for which she was co-editor of the book with the same title.

Please RSVP on the sign-up form below:

On Monday May 2nd (17h00 in C-104) and Tuesday May 3rd (10h00-12h00 in U-2), Emilie Garrigou-Kempton (USC) and Wolf Gruner (USC) will lead two workshops introducing faculty and students to the Visual History Archives and creative ways that the archives can be used in teaching and research. You are invited to attend either session, the content of the workshops will be the same. The workshop on May 2nd will be in English and on May 3rd in French. Using the USC Visual History Archives for Research and Teaching.

Following the workshop on Monday May 2nd (18h30 in C-104), Wolf Gruner, historian and director of the Center for Advanced Genocide Research at USC, will present his research on Jewish resistance during the Shoah, which draws extensively on the Visual History Archives. Defiance and Protest. Forgotten Individual Jewish Reactions to the Persecution in Nazi Germany.

Wolf Gruner

Wolf Gruner holds the Shapell-Guerin Chair in Jewish Studies, is Professor of History at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles since 2008 and is the Founding Director of the USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research since 2014. He is a specialist in the history of the Holocaust and in comparative genocide studies. He received his PhD in History in 1994 from the Technical University Berlin as well as his Habilitation in 2006. He is the author of nine books on the Holocaust, among them “Jewish Forced Labor under the Nazis. Economic Needs and Nazi Racial Aims”, with Cambridge University Press (paperback 2008), as well as over 60 academic articles and book chapters. He is a member of the International Academic Advisory board of the Center for the Research on the Holocaust in Germany at Yad Vashem’s International Institute for Holocaust Research.

Emilie Garrigou-Kempton

Emilie Garrigou-Kempton is the Academic Relations and Outreach officer at the Center for Advanced Genocide Research. A native of France, Emilie Garrigou-Kempton received a B.A. and a M.A. in Philosophy from Bordeaux University and a M.A. in International Development from Lyons University. She worked for several international humanitarian agencies and was an ethics advisor for the Los Angeles Unified School District before obtaining her Ph.D. in French literature and gender studies at USC.

The George and Irina Schaeffer Center for the Study of Genocide, Human Rights and Conflict Prevention invites you to a film screening and lecture on the history of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon.

The George and Irina Schaeffer Center for the Study of Genocide, Human Rights and Conflict Prevention invites you to attend a lecture by Jeffrey Shandler, Professor and Chair of Jewish Studies at Rutgers University, who will speak on the subject of videotaped interviews with Holocaust survivors. 

The visual component of video interviews with survivors of the Holocaust is what distinguishes these from other forms of documenting survivors’ life stories, whether in written form or audio recording. But what is the difference between watching these stories rather than simply reading or listening to them? Exceptional moments in these videos, such as when survivors display wartime injuries or religious articles that they had during the war, both disrupt the recordings’ austere visual aesthetic of “talking heads” and reveal the power of watching survivors relate their wartime experiences. These particular moments also resonate with longstanding visual vocabularies of offering evidence that concretizes faith, linking act of seeing with believing.

Jeffrey Shandler's biography

Jeffrey Shandler is Professor and Chair of Jewish Studies at Rutgers University. He received a PhD in Yiddish Studies from Columbia University. Shandler’s books include While America Watches: Televising the Holocaust (Oxford University Press, 1999), Adventures in Yiddishland: Postvernacular Language and Culture (University of California Press, 2005), Jews, God, and Videotape: Religion and Media in America (New York University Press, 2009), and Shtetl: A Vernacular Intellectual History (Rutgers University Press, 2014). Among other titles, Shandler is the editor of Awakening Lives: Autobiographies of Jewish Youth in Poland before the Holocaust (Yale University Press, 2002) and is co-editor of Anne Frank Unbound: Media, Imagination, Memory (Indiana University Press, 2012). His translations of Yiddish literature include Emil and Karl, a Holocaust novel for young readers by Yankev Glatshteyn (Roaring Brook, 2006).  Shandler has served as president of the Association for Jewish Studies and is a fellow of the American Academy for Jewish Research.