Eastern Michigan University(EMU)

Sponsored by EMU's Center for Jewish Studies with Psychology as a departmental co-sponsor, and the Ann Arbor chapter of ORT America, authors Rita Benn, Fran Lewy Berg and Avishay Hayut were invited to share their experiences in writing their stories to a mixed audience of EMU faculty, students and community members. The recording of their March 27 panel presentation and Q & A is available here.
The authors were enthused in particular by the personal discussions they had with several non-Jewish college students during their book signing. A student of Polish background talked about the interest happening in her home town of Lublin to learn about the history of the Holocaust. She shared that she was buying our book to send to her mother living in Poland. Another student majoring in psychology and international relations indicated she wanted to read our book to learn more about this period in history because of her specific interest in trauma, and potential work with people who might have a somewhat similar history in terms of displacement and loss of home. Still another student's interest was deeply personal. Originally of Mexican and German descent, she hoped to better understand the history of her German ancestry from a Jewish perspective. This interest amongst the university students affirmed the importance in educating these young people about the Holocaust.

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