UMASS, HOLOCAUST CENTER WEIGH PARTNERSHIP
By Nick Grabbe
Amherst Bulletin
34274/
March 20 2009
MA
A Holocaust education center in Springfield is considering a move to
the University of Massachusetts campus so it can reach more people
with lessons about genocide, oppression and social justice.
UMass professors working on the partnership envision an
interdisciplinary Holocaust center that would involve academic
programs such as classes, internships, workshops and public school
curricula. They use as a model the Center for Renaissance Studies on
East Pleasant Street.
Academic interest in the Holocaust is booming, said James Young,
a professor of Judaic studies. There are 180 students in his course
on Holocaust literature and some who are interested are turned away,
he said.
"We want to know how we got to where we are, and that means retracing
our path," he said. "We need to understand contemporary genocide in
the context of past genocide."
On March 24, there will be an opening reception at UMass for an exhibit
that will serve as a public introduction of the new partnership. "A
Reason to Remember" includes photos and personal testimonies about five
Jewish families in a rural village in Germany from 1933 to 1942. It
will be exhibited at the Herter Gallery through April 9. The reception
is planned at the Fine Arts Center from 4 to 6 p.m.
Debbie Roth-Howe of Amherst and her father, who escaped from the
village and came to the U.S. in 1938, put together the exhibit. It was
first shown at the Hatikvah ("hope" in Hebrew) Holocaust Education
Center in Springfield in 2004. A traveling version of the exhibit
has been all over the country since then.
Seeds of partnership
The idea for a partnership between UMass and the center came from
Lara Curtis of Longmeadow. She is vice chair of the center’s board
and a graduate student in comparative literature at UMass.
"I felt we could reach more people in a more dynamic setting," she
said. "There is a continuing issue with genocide, and we tend to use
the Holocaust as a model to think about the past and how we can deal
with these issues today."
The center, which started in 1997, is already going beyond hosting an
exhibit. It started developing curricula on the Holocaust for secondary
schools in 2006 and is working with the UMass School of Education and
the state Board of Education on a program of instruction for teachers.
A draft agreement between the center and UMass foresees its relocation
to the Amherst campus to pursue "teaching, research, outreach and
community service involving students and the general public." It seeks
the development of master’s and doctoral programs in Holocaust and
Genocide Studies and expansion of its library, which now has 3,500
volumes and 350 audiovisual materials.
The definition of the Holocaust is expanding to include not only
Jews but also Poles, gypsies, homosexuals, the disabled and other
marginalized groups, Young said. President Clinton invoked the
Holocaust in seeking to prevent a genocide in Kosovo in the 1990s,
he said.
"The further we get away from the events of the Holocaust, the
more interest there is in how these get passed down to us," Young
said. "The survivors’ generation was ambivalent about what to do with
the memories. Once you’re a generation or two removed, you have a
more comfortable distance that allows people to think it through."
Hitler studied the Armenian genocide of 1915-17 and people today should
study the Holocaust to prevent a recurrence, he said. Donald Maddox,
a UMass professor of French and Italian who has also been involved
in planning for the partnership, cited the genocide in Darfur.
"This is something that needs to be brought before our students again
and again because of the tremendous atrocities we have today," he said.
The partnership is consistent with the UMass goal of reaching out to
Springfield, Young said. Some part of the Hatikvah Holocaust Center
would probably remain in Springfield, but exactly what has not been
determined.
There will need to be significant fundraising if the new center is
to have a home on or near campus. This effort came to a halt when
the economy collapsed last fall, Young said.
His dream is the donation of a house close to the campus. The
Renaissance Center is housed on the estate that the late Janet Dakin
donated to UMass.
To buy an existing house, renovate it and establish an endowment would
require several million dollars, Young said. To start from scratch
would require a prohibitively high cost of $5 million to $6 million,
he said.
But the group has met with Tom Milligan, the executive vice chancellor
for university relations, and Chancellor Robert Holub is expected to
attend the March 24 reception.
And they believe they are promoting a powerful concept: that the
study of the Holocaust has profound relevance for everyday lives.
"What can we learn? We can learn more about ourselves than past
events," Young said. "What does it mean to watch without acting? How
innocent are bystanders?"
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
