Univision Colorado will air a two-part series on the Holocaust, No Podemos Olvidar, (We Cannot Forget), during their 5 and 10 p.m. newscasts Nov. 10 and 11. It includes interviews with professors in DU’s Center for Judaic Studies (CJS) and the Holocaust Awareness Institute (HAI).
The segments, specially produced for the November ratings period, will be produced and reported by Senior Anchor Rodolfo Cardenas, who was on campus Oct. 31 to interview CJS Director Sarah Pessin and HAI scholar-in-residence Janet Rumfelt.
“We hope to increase awareness of the Holocaust among the Hispanic population,” Cardenas says. “The only way to avoid something like this is to educate ourselves about it.”
Cardenas, who grew up in Venezuela, doesn’t believe the Holocaust was taught prevalently in Latin America. Yet the topic sparked his interest.
“I’ve always been very interested in reading and researching and knowing about all that happened then,” Cardenas says.
Cardenas says the first segment will focus on why and how the Holocaust happened. Much of the piece will include footage and interviews from a Venezuelan documentary and his interview with Rumfelt.
The second segment will focus on what is being done 60 years after the Holocaust. For this, Cardenas interviewed Pessin about DU’s Holocaust memorial, learning and social action site.
“I was very moved to learn of Rodolfo Cardenas’ personal study of the Holocaust and of his long-standing desire to inform Spanish-speaking audiences of a critical piece of history he feels is mostly unknown in his community,” Pessin says.
The Univision project is “the kind of intercultural dialogue” Pessin hopes the Holocaust memorial, together with the future endowed chair of Holocaust studies, will foster on campus and in the larger community.