Annual Fall HEFNU/CCHS Lecture

Annual fall lecture hosted by the holocaust Educational foundation & the Nicholas D. Chabraja Center for Historical StudieS

Remnants of Light: Holocaust Photographs in History and Memory

Dr. Valerie Hébert, Lakehead University Orillia 

Wednesday, October 18
5:00 PM - 7:00 PM Central
Harris Hall, Room 108

In-Person Only | Open to the Public | Reception to Follow

Holocaust photographs are nearly unbearable to look at, so why should we? This lecture will present an overview of Holocaust photography and the pressing ethical concerns that arise when engaging with it. By leading listeners through analyses of selected Holocaust photographs, Dr. Hébert will demonstrate the complex and multi-layered meanings photographs possess, the specific ways they deepen our understanding of this history, and the memories they preserve.  

Attendees should be aware that the presentation will include graphic images of suffering.

Bio: Valerie Hébert is Professor of History and Interdisciplinary Studies at Lakehead University Orillia where she teaches on modern European history, Nazi Germany, the Holocaust, and the photography of human rights violations and international conflict. She has won fellowships from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Hebrew University, and the Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. She has published on the Nuremberg Trials, Rwanda’s Gacaca Tribunals, the German resistance figure Kurt Gerstein, and Holocaust Photography. Her edited collection on the Šķēde beach execution photographs entitled: Framing the Holocaust: Photographs of a Mass Shooting in Latvia, 1941 was published by the University of Wisconsin Press in August 2023. She is currently working on a SSHRC Insight Grant funded monograph:  Five Shots from Sdolbunow: Photographs of the Holocaust by Bullets, 1942.