Calendar

The UMass Amherst Institute for Holocaust, Genocide, and Memory Studies hosts a daylong symposium honoring the work of James Young, Distinguished Professor emeritus of English and Judaic and Near Eastern studies and founding director of the institute.

The symposium, “Edges, Textures, Stages: James Young and the Field of Memory Studies,” will be followed by a reception until 6:30 p.m. The symposium and reception are free and open to the public.

Young, an important figure in the field of memory studies, taught at UMass Amherst from 1988 until his retirement in 2018. He also has consulted with municipal agencies in developing memorials and was a jury member for the National 9/11 Memorial competition.

He is the author of “Writing and Rewriting the Holocaust,” “The Texture of Memory,” “At Memory’s Edge: After-images of the Holocaust in Contemporary Art and Architecture,” and “The Stages of Memory: Reflections on Memorial Art, Loss, and the Spaces Between.”

The symposium will feature panel talks by visiting scholars, including:

• Lawrence Douglas, James J. Grosfeld Professor of Law, Jurisprudence and Social Thought at Amherst College and author of “The Right Wrong Man: John Demjanjuk and the Last Great Nazi War Crimes Trial”
• Alice M. Greenwald, president and chief executive officer of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum
• Debórah Dwork, Rose Professor of Holocaust History, founding director of the Strassler Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Clark University and co-author of “Flight from the Reich: Refugee Jews, 1933-1946” and “Auschwitz”
• Horst Hoheisel, sculpture artist and designer of “counter-monuments” such as “The Crushed Brandenburg Gate”
• Laura Levitt, professor of religion, Jewish studies and gender at Temple University and author of “American Jewish Loss after the Holocaust”
• Samuel Kassow, Charles H. Northam Professor of History at Trinity College and author of “Who will Write our History: Emanuel Ringelblum and the Oyneg Shabes Archive”

Learn about (and help support) the ongoing project to restore the Bagnowka Jewish cemetery in Bialystok, Poland, the only remaining Jewish cemetery in the city.

A second memorial wall made of rescued matzevot has been constructed next to the 2011 original memorial wall and will be inaugurated. These are matzevot that were buried under local streets and have been recovered in recent months, thanks to the the initiative and efforts of Grzegorz Grzybowski and with the support of Mayor Kowalski and local military authorities.  

Gregorz Grzybowski is the contractor who designed and built the wall and plaza at the cemetery that was dedicated in 2011. 

It is known that there are still partial and full headstones scattered around the city that had been used for walls, walkways, etc. The Mayor’s office has undertaken a program to encourage people who have these to turn them in to the city and receive replacement blocks or decorative pavers in return.

The dedication of the new monument takes place withing an annual reunion of descendants from Nowy Dwor Mazowiecki, taking place June 4-6.

The historic Jewish cemetery in Tarnow, Poland will be ceremonially rededicated after years of extensive restoration work.

The rededication ceremony on June 26 takes places within the context of the two-day Tarnow Jewish Reunion.

Other events include a walking tour of Jewish Tarnow, photography exhibit, Jewish cemetery tour and visit to family graves.

See program below.

Ten non-Jewish Poles who preserve, protect, and maintain Jewish cultural heritage in Poland will be honored at the 24th edition of the Preserving Memory awards, honors that were established by Michael Traison in 1998.

The ceremony will take place at the Galicia Jewish Museum in Krakow but will also be live streamed via Zoom and Facebook.

Register for the Zoom feed at the following link:

The 25th edition of the “Preserving Memory” awards honoring non-Jewish Poles who care for Jewish heritage in Poland.

Gala ceremony to mark the 200th anniversary of the synagogue in Ingwiller.