21st Annual Holocaust Education Week
Opening: Sunday, October 27 | 3 p.m. | Paul O’Regan Hall, Halifax Central Library | 5440 Spring Garden Road, Halifax, NS
Keynote Speaker: Eva Mroczek, Simon and Riva Spatz Chair in Jewish Studies, Associate Professor, Religious Studies, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS.
Opening Remarks: Dr. Jim Spatz, Executive Chairman Southwest Properties
“Jewish Lament Poetry Across 2500 Years”
The ancient Sumerians already composed poetry about catastrophic loss around 2000 BCE, and their moving laments for destroyed cities profoundly influenced the biblical Book of Lamentations (Eikhah). In turn, Lamentations—especially its questioning of divine justice and its moving depictions of maternal grief—became a key source for rabbinic, medieval, and modern Jewish lament, including Holocaust literature. This talk will trace the long history of how Jewish writers have responded to catastrophe, their own and those of others, through an expansive, always-renewing poetic tradition that demands remembrance and compassion from its hearers.
Eva Mroczek is Associate Professor in the Department of Classics at Dalhousie University and the Simon and Riva Spatz Chair in Jewish Studies. She holds a PhD from the University of Toronto in Religious Studies and Jewish Studies. Mroczek specializes in Ancient Judaism, with a focus on the Dead Sea Scrolls, biblical literature and other Hebrew and Aramaic texts, and the history of Jewish scriptural interpretation. Prior to coming to Dalhousie, she taught at Indiana University and the University of California, Davis, where she directed the Jewish Studies program.
Reception to follow the program | Live-streamed in Atlantic Canada (link to the live stream will be posted here closer to the date)
***************************************
Friday, November 1 | 2 p.m. | Paul O’Regan Hall, Halifax Central Library | 5440 Spring Garden Road, Halifax, NS
Keynote Speaker: Dorota Glowacka, Professor of Humanities, University of King’s College.
“Hidden Words: The Holocaust Through the Eyes of Young Diary Writers”
What was it like to be a teenager in the Łódź ghetto in 1942 and 1943, struggling with hunger and disease yet yearning for love and a good book to read? What did it feel like for a thirteen-year-old to spend two years hidden in a box underground? This presentation will look at the Holocaust through the lens of diaries written by young writers during the Holocaust. We will read and reflect on excerpts from The Diary Dawid Sierakowiak, Rywka’s Diary: The Writings of a Jewish Girl from the Lodz Ghetto, and Buried Words: The Diary of Molly Applebaum.
Dorota Glowacka is Professor of Humanities at the University of King’s College where she teaches critical theory, gender theory, and Holocaust and genocide studies. Glowacka’s current research focuses on gender and the Holocaust, the intersections of the Holocaust and settler colonial genocides in North America, and the politics of translating Holocaust diaries and memoirs. She is a member of the Academic Committee of the Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Research at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.
This program is open to the public and high school students: To register your students, please contact: Edna LeVine, Atlantic Jewish Council Director of Community Engagement: engagement @ theajc.ca
Reception to follow the program | Live-streamed in Atlantic Canada (link to the live stream will be posted here closer to the date)
***************************************************
Monday, November 4 | 6:30 p.m. | Rowe Hall | Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 |
1055 Marginal Road, Halifax, NS.
Keynote Speaker: Eva Kuper, Holocaust survivor, in conversation with Elin Beaumont, Special Events and Holocaust Survivor Relations, The Azrieli Foundation.
Eva Kuper was born in Warsaw, Poland, in 1940. After Eva’s mother was deported from the Warsaw ghetto, Eva’s father escaped with his young daughter. A family friend arranged safe places for Eva to hide until the end of the war, including at a convent run by Catholic nuns. Eva was reunited with her surviving family members after the war, and in 1949 she immigrated to Canada with her father and stepmother. Eva lives in Montreal.
Copies of Eva Kuper’s memoir, A Beacon of Light, from Before All Memory is Lost: Women’s Voices from the Holocaust, published by The Azrieli Foundation, are provided to attendees compliments of The Azrieli Foundation.
Reception to follow the program
*********************************
Wednesday, November 6 | 6:30 p.m. | Paul O’Regan Hall, Halifax Central Library | 5440 Spring Garden Road, Halifax, NS.
Keynote Speakers: Peggy and Shimon Walt
“Finding Our Jewish Family in Lithuania”, followed by a conversation with Olga Milosevich, retired CBC Radio Broadcaster.
There were five in cellist Shimon Walt’s family growing up: him and his brother, his parents, and his grandmother, a fortunate few in the just five per cent of Lithuania’s Jews who survived the Holocaust. When his wife asked the names of the other family members who’d been killed, he didn’t know; what happened in Vilna, the “Jerusalem of Lithuania,” was never discussed. Peggy was determined to find them.
In 2023 Shimon returned to his birthplace, meeting cousins for the first time, and visiting killing sites in Estonia and Lithuania where members of his family had been murdered. To honour them, he borrowed a cello and played at Ponar. The couple next travelled to Israel to share what they’d found with Shimon’s 95-year-old mother. Hear the story about finding the lost family, and Shimon’s emotional return to Vilna in this talk illustrated with photos and music.
Peggy Walt has worked for over 40 years in the arts and culture field in Nova Scotia. In 2022 she received a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Nonfiction from the University of King’s College, working with Israeli-Canadian author Ayelet Tsabari and Canadian essayist Jane Silcott. She received the Marian Hebb Research Scholarship from Access Copyright Canada for a research trip to Lithuania, Estonia and Israel and is writing a book about her husband’s family and her conversion to Judaism.
Shimon Walt is acclaimed for his artistry and dedication to the cultural life of his adopted province of Nova Scotia, where he has had a 47-year career as Assistant Principal Cellist with Symphony Nova Scotia and its predecessor. He is a cherished teacher, colleague and mentor, and has premiered many new works for cello. Born in Vilnius, he holds dual Canadian and Israeli passports. Shimon was recently awarded the King Charles III Coronation Medal for his service to the arts in Nova Scotia and Canada.
Reception to follow the program
**********************************
Student Programs
Registration required, please email: Edna LeVine, Atlantic Jewish Council Director of Community Engagement: engagement @ theajc.ca.
Friday, November 1 | 2 p.m. | Paul O’Regan Hall, Halifax Central Library | 5440 Spring Garden Road, Halifax, NS | In-person and Live-streamed in Atlantic Canada | Keynote Speaker: Dorota Glowacka, Professor of Humanities, University of King’s College. | “Hidden Words: The Holocaust Through the Eyes of Young Diary Writers”. This program is open to the public and high school students.
Tuesday, November 5 | 10:15 a.m. AT | Student Program | In-person and Live–streamed in Atlantic Canada | Student Program with Holocaust survivor Eva Kuper. Limited seats. Junior High and High School students only.
*******************************************
Holocaust Education Week
Holocaust Education Week is presented by the Atlantic Jewish Council, and made possible, in part, by a generous grant from The Azrieli Foundation. Programs offered are in partnership with the University of King’s College, Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21, Dalhousie University, and with support from the Halifax Central Library.