holocaust remembrance week

Mon., Apr 20

The Judaic Studies Program, The Office of the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs, The Office of the Vice President for Student Affairs, and Hilton C. Buley Library,  invite you to:

Holocaust Remembrance at SCSU: A Week of Reflection, April 20-24, 2009

April 20, 1-2 p.m., Engleman Hall A120. Armen Marsoobian, SCSU Philosophy Department, will present a lecture entitled, "How Do We Memorialize Genocide?: The Case of the Berlin Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe."
 
April 21, 3:30-4:30 p.m., Engleman Hall C112.  A commemorative ceremony to mark Holocaust Remembrance Day, featuring music performed by David Chevan (SCSU Music Department) and The Afro-Semitic Experience, and the poetry of esteemed Yiddish writer Irena Klepfisz ("A Child in the Warsaw Ghetto;" "Bashert"), read by Corinne Blackmer, SCSU English Department.

April 22, 1-2 p.m., Engleman Hall A120.  A book panel discussion in cooperation with Hilton C. Buley Library: Varian Fry's Surrender on Demand  -- Fry's account of his efforts to save 2,000 Jewish artists and intellectuals from the Nazis in Marseille, France, in 1940. Varian Fry (right) was from the tri-state area. He was born in Harlem, October 15, 1907, and then grew up in Ridgewood, N.J. He attended The Hotchkiss School in Lakeville, Conn., in 1922 and then attended and graduated from Harvard in May 1931.  Fry was named Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur shortly before his death and was posthumously honored as "Righteous Among the Nations" at Yad Vashem in recognition of his heroic acts. In his later years he lived in Connecticut. At the time of his death in 1967, Fry was a teacher of classical languages at Joel Barlow High School in Redding, Conn. The book panel is moderated by Martin Laskin, SCSU Sociology Department, and the  panelists include Corinne Blackmer, English Department; Shirley Cavanagh, Library Services, and David Pettigrew, Philosophy Department.

April 22, 7-10:30 p.m., Engleman Hall A120.  A film presentation of Roman Polanski's Academy Award-winning "The Pianist," the true story of Wladyslaw Szpilman's survival in the Warsaw Ghetto. Introduction and discussion with Krystyna Gorniak, SCSU Philosophy Department.

April 23, 1:50-3:05 p.m., Engleman Hall A120.  Internationally renowned playwright Catherine Filloux (right) will present a lecture entitled "Lemkin's House: Responding to Genocide," examining the life and work of the Polish-Jewish jurist who coined the term "genocide" and championed its inscription in the law.

April 20 - 24 Varian Fry Surrender on Demand Book Exhibit at Hilton C. Buley Library
 
Varian Fry's Surrender on Demand and Wladyslaw Szpilman's The Pianist: The Extraordinary True Story of One Man's Survival in Warsaw, 1939-1945 will be available to be purchased from the SCSU bookstore.

Varian Fry, Surrender on Demand (Boulder, Colo.: Johnson Books, 1997). Published in conjunction with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.
Wladyslaw Szpilman, The Pianist: The Extraordinary True Story of One Man's Survival in Warsaw, 1939-1945. trans. Anthea Bell (New York: Picador, 2000).

For more information about any of these events, contact David Levine at levined1@southernct.edu or (203) 392-6642, or David Pettigrew at pettigrewd1@southernct.edu or (203) 392-6778.