On April 8 at 7 p.m. in front of Sturm Hall, the University of Denver’s Holocaust and Genocide Awareness Week will begin with an interfaith service and 24-hour litany of the names of Holocaust victims.
Facilitated by members of DU’s Inter-Fraternal Council, the reading is intended to help students of any nationality, religion or sexual orientation identify with the past.
“We believe the Holocaust is pertinent to all people, not just Jewish people,” says Joel Portman, a freshman management major. “All genocides are similar, and it is important to understand the underlying causes to learn how genocides can be stopped and prevented,” he says.
Portman is a founder of Never Again!, the student group sponsoring the week’s programming. Through a series of speakers, lunches, panel discussions and films that go through April 16, events will focus on the range of Holocaust victims and the relationship between past and present genocides.
On April 10 at 7 p.m. in Sturm Hall’s Lindsey Auditorium, oral historian and political activist Lani Silver will speak on her personal experience interviewing more than 1,400 Holocaust survivors. As a consultant to Steven Spielberg, Silver trained interviewers for the Shoah Foundation for Visual History Holocaust Project, where she oversaw the collection of more than 53,000 oral histories.
A panel discussion with local Holocaust survivors Jack Adler and Osi Sladek will take place April 12 at 7:30 p.m. in the Sturm College of Law. A genocide exhibit and flag display will be presented until April 15, and an art show will be featured until April 16.
All programs are free and open to the public. See the Holocaust Awareness Institute for more information.