Fall 2020
Prof. Atina Grossmann (Cooper Union, New York) on Jewish Escapes from Europe under Nazi Rule -- In Commemoration of the November 1938 "Kristallnacht" Pogroms
The Center for Judaic, Holocaust, and Peace Studies proudly invites the public to an online lecture by Prof. Atina Grossmann, Professor of History in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at the Cooper Union in New York City. Her evening lecture is entitled “Remapping Survival: Jewish Refugees and Lost Memories of Displacement, Trauma, and Rescue in the Soviet Union, Iran, and India” and will start on Monday, November 9, at 7:00 pm. Her talk integrates the largely unexamined experiences and lost memories of displacement and trauma of European Jews who managed to flee to the Far East into our understanding of the Shoah, and to remap the landscape of persecution, survival, relief and rescue during and after World War. The event also marks and commemorates the 82nd anniversary of Kristallnacht, the nationwide pogroms in Hitler Germany that began on November 9, 1938, and marked the prewar turning point in the Nazi regime's persecution of the country's Jewish population.
Prof. Grossmann is a specialist in German-Jewish history, Holocaust Studies, and women's and gender history and the author and co-editor of many path-breaking studies that helped to reshape various academic fields. These works include Jews, Germans, and Allies: Close Encounters in Occupied Germany (2007), Wege in der Fremde: Deutsch-jüdische Begegnungsgeschichte zwischen New York, Berlin und Teheran (2012), and Reforming Sex: The German Movement for Birth Control and Abortion Reform, 1920-1950 (1995) as well as the co-edited volumes on Shelter from the Holocaust: Rethinking Jewish Survival in the Soviet Union (2017), After the Nazi Racial State: Difference and Democracy in Germany and Europe (2009), and When Biology Became Destiny: Women in Weimar and Nazi Germany (1984). Prof. Grossmann is the daughter of German-Jewish Holocaust survivors.
From 11:00 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. on the following day, Tues., Nov. 10, Prof. Grossmann's broader work will be featured in the Center's final F’20 Lunch Research Colloquium (also on ZOOM). Like all colloquia, it is based on two pre-circulated publications by our guest that all participants will read before the start of the session.
Organized by the Center for Judaic, Holocaust, and Peace Studies, the programs are co-sponsored by ASU Departments of History, Interdisciplinary Studies, and Literatures, Languages and Cultures, the German Program and the Peace and Genocide Education Club.
Like (almost) all Center events, these online programs are free of charge and open to the public. To attend the 11/9 ZOOM lecture, pleaseregister here.
To participate in the 11/10 colloquium and receive copies of the colloquium texts, please register here. For more information about the events, please contact the Center at 828.262.2311 or holocaust@appstate.edu.
Center Program with Leading Oral Historian and Expert on Holocaust Survivor Testimonies
The Center for Judaic, Holocaust, and Peace Studies invites to a public online presentation by renowned oral historian and Holocaust studies scholar Dr. Henry ("Hank") Greenspan, Lecturer Emeritus, Residential College, Social Theory and Practice Program, University of Michigan--Ann Arbor. His presentation entitled "Reflections from Fifty Years of Listening to Holocaust Survivors: Contrarian Views" will start on Tuesday, October 6, at 7:00 pm on ZOOM. Dr. Greenspan has been interviewing, teaching, and writing about Holocaust survivors since the 1970s. Rather than one-time “testimonies,” his approach has been to meet with survivors in sustained conversation: over months, years, and, in a few cases, decades. He is the author of the influential study On Listening to Holocaust Survivors: Beyond Testimony, which details his approaches. In addition, Dr. Greenspan is a psychologist and playwright. He has performed his award-winning play, REMNANTS, at more than 300 venues worldwide.
Like almost all Center events, this online program is free of charge and open to the public. The lecture will be followed by a Q-and-A. To get the link for the ZOOM meeting, instructions on how to install ZOOM on a computer or smartphone, and more information about the event, please contact the Center at 828.262.2311 or holocaust@appstate.edu
In addition, Dr. Greenspan's studies will be at the center of the CJHPS's second lunch research colloquium, which gives faculty and students an opportunity to discuss his work with survivors in a smaller setting. The colloquium will also take place on Oct. 6 (11:00 am-12:30 pm) and be held on ZOOM. To register and obtain the two texts on which the colloquium is based, please contact the Center (see above).
Center Lecture by Renowned Polish-Jewish Intellectual and Opposition Journalist Prof. Kostek Gebert (Warsaw, Poland) on the Shoah in German-Occupied Poland and Today's Polish Memory Politics
The Center for Judaic, Holocaust, and Peace Studies is exceedingly proud to invite the ASU and off-campus communities to a public online presentation by the prominent intellectual, opposition journalist, and voice of the Polish-Jewish community Prof. Kostek Gebert. He will be speaking to us from Poland's capital. Prf. Gebert's presentation is entitled "The Shoah and Polish-Jewish Relations: History and Politics of Memory in Present-Day Poland." The event will start on Thursday, September 10, at 11:00 am (also accounting for the time difference between the East Coast and Poland) on ZOOM. After writing for underground publications during the 1980s, Prof. Gebert joined the newly-founded Gazeta Wyborcza, now the leading Polish daily, in 1989 and continues to contribute to many Polish and international media outlets, including the BBC. He also established Midrasz magazine, which remains Poland’s most influential Jewish publication. He is the author of sixteen books and countless articles and editorials. Finally, Prof. Gebert is involved in (re)building the Jewish community in Poland and has long become one of its most prominent voices.
Earlier this year, Prof. Gebert was named the first Senior Center Fellow, but prevented from coming to NC due to the current suspension of visa programs by the US State Department. The Center is honored to be able to welcome him to this ZOOM program.
This online lecture and discussionisfreeofchargeand open to the public. To get the link for the ZOOM meeting, instructions on how to install ZOOM on a computer or smartphone, and more information about the event, please contact the Center at 828.262.2311 or holocaust@appstate.edu
Running and Hiding from The Nazis—A Child Survivor’s Miraculous Escape From The Holocaust: Miriam Klein Kassenoff in Conversation with Center Director Thomas Pegelow Kaplan
While this year’s Rosen symposium on Children during the Holocaust has been postponed due to the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, the Center for Judaic, Holocaust, and Peace Studies offers a number of online programs that are free of charge and open to the public.
The Center invites the public to its first 2020-21 online program, a conversation between child survivor Dr. Miriam Klein Kassenoff (Florida) and Center Director Dr. Thomas Pegelow Kaplan. The program will start on Monday, July 27, at 7:00 pm on ZOOM. Klein Kassenoff was born in Košice, present-day Slovakia. In 1940, she and her family embarked on a dangerous seven-month long escape through seven European countries until they managed to reach Lisbon and set sail to the U.S. Today, she serves as the Director of the Holocaust Teachers Institute at the University of Miami.
To get the link for the ZOOM meeting, instructions on how to install ZOOM on a computer or smartphone, and more information about the event, please contact the Center at 828.262.2311 or holocaust@appstate.edu.
Center Events with Prof. Yaakov Ariel (UNC-Chapel Hill) on Evangelical Christians and Jews
The Center for Judaic, Holocaust, and Peace Studies invites the public to an online lecture by Prof. Yaakov Ariel, Carolina Center for Jewish Studies/Department of Religious Studies, University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, on Mon., Oct. 26, 7:00 – 9:00 p.m. Prof. Ariel's lecture will focus on An Unexpected Enchantment: Evangelical Christians and Jews, also the title of one of his thought-provoking recent books. His lecture will be followed by a Q-and-A. A specialist in Judaism in the Modern World, Prof. Ariel is one of the foremost experts in Evangelical Christianity's attitudes towards the Jewish people and the Holy Land and on Christian-Jewish relations in the late modern era. He has published numerous articles, book chapters and three monographs on these subjects. Prof. Ariel also co-led the Carolina Center for Jewish Studies at UNC-Chapel Hill.
From 1:00 - 2:30 p.m. on the same day, Prof. Ariel's broader work will be featured in the Center's fourth F’20 Lunch Research Colloquium(also on ZOOM). Like all colloquia, it is based on two pre-circulated publications by our guest that all participants will read before the start of the session.
Like (almost) all Center events, these online programs are free of charge and open to the public. To get the link for either one of these ZOOM meetings, copies of the colloquium texts, and more information about the events, please contact the Center at 828.262.2311 or holocaust@appstate.edu