Tweet
Holocaust archive brought to UK, Armenian Genocide testimonies to be added
January 28, 2012 - 21:31 AMT
PanARMENIAN.Net - The arrival in Britain of an archive of tens of
thousands of Holocaust testimonies will give much needed historical
weight to the experiences of survivors, according to a leading
scholar.
David Cesarani, of the Holocaust Research Centre at the University of
London, believes that the U.S. video archive, set up 18 years ago by
Steven Spielberg, will help to rebalance a picture that has been
dominated by the study of the perpetrators of the atrocities of the
World War II.
The extraordinary catalogue of personal testimony, collected by the
Shoah Foundation Institute since the film director made Schindler's
Listin 1993, is housed at the University of Southern California, but
on Friday, Jan 27, it was formally shared with academics and students
at the research centre at Royal Holloway to mark Holocaust Memorial
Day.
Cesarani believes the archive facility will set British historical
research in the right context. "It is going to have a huge impact," he
said. "This is an authentic resource for British researchers and
historians which will give them access to the experiences of people
who have never written anything down. Too much of the history of the
Holocaust has been about the perpetrators. The survivors, with a few
exceptions, have tended to disappear from the scene."
Smith hopes that non-specialists will also visit the archive. The USC
Shoah Foundation Institute is broadening its archive to incorporate
testimony from survivors of other genocides. It is collecting
testimony in Rwanda, where the Aegis Trust set up the Kigali Memorial
Centre in 2004. This year Rwandan and Armenian testimony should be
added to the visual history archive.
January 28, 2012 - 21:31 AMT
PanARMENIAN.Net - The arrival in Britain of an archive of tens of
thousands of Holocaust testimonies will give much needed historical
weight to the experiences of survivors, according to a leading
scholar.
David Cesarani, of the Holocaust Research Centre at the University of
London, believes that the U.S. video archive, set up 18 years ago by
Steven Spielberg, will help to rebalance a picture that has been
dominated by the study of the perpetrators of the atrocities of the
World War II.
The extraordinary catalogue of personal testimony, collected by the
Shoah Foundation Institute since the film director made Schindler's
Listin 1993, is housed at the University of Southern California, but
on Friday, Jan 27, it was formally shared with academics and students
at the research centre at Royal Holloway to mark Holocaust Memorial
Day.
Cesarani believes the archive facility will set British historical
research in the right context. "It is going to have a huge impact," he
said. "This is an authentic resource for British researchers and
historians which will give them access to the experiences of people
who have never written anything down. Too much of the history of the
Holocaust has been about the perpetrators. The survivors, with a few
exceptions, have tended to disappear from the scene."
Smith hopes that non-specialists will also visit the archive. The USC
Shoah Foundation Institute is broadening its archive to incorporate
testimony from survivors of other genocides. It is collecting
testimony in Rwanda, where the Aegis Trust set up the Kigali Memorial
Centre in 2004. This year Rwandan and Armenian testimony should be
added to the visual history archive.