Virtually everyone has listened to a popular song with its lyrics changed for comedic or dramatic effect. But a perhaps little-known fact of the Holocaust is that this type of parody was also a common practice in some of the most hellish places on Earth: concentration camps.

Musician and music scholar Alexandra Birch will discuss the resistance demonstrated by one of the 20th century’s most renowned composers, Dmitri Shostakovich, in her presentation at the Music as Resistance to Genocide academic symposium.

Musicologist Janie Cole will discuss how “freedom songs” provided an oppressed community with political expression, resistance, therapy, identity, memory and resilience to confront potential violence and death.

​At the academic symposium, scholars will discuss how music was used as resistance in a number of conflicts around the world. Tina Frühauf will instead focus on the very definition of “resistance” itself.

One of Poland's most beloved films is a unique example of music uniting both Jews and gentiles in the immediate post-war period that would soon become very difficult to find anywhere else.

When I commenced my PhD journey three years ago at Edge Hill University in northern England, I had little idea of where the journey would take me, both literally and figuratively.

Sandya Maulana’s presentation at the symposium is a chance to discuss an issue from his native Indonesia that has yet to be discussed even in Indonesia itself.

The conference included a night of films, an academic symposium and a concert, all exploring music as it has been used as a form of resistance to genocides throughout history.

There is a current controversy about the allegation that the great mufti of Jerusalem instigated the final solution of the Nazis. While there is no doubt that Haj Amin al-Husseini, was a virulent anti-Semite, history shows that the Final Solution was conceived and implemented by Nazis and nobody else.

The USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research invites applications from senior scholars for its 2016-2017 Center Research Fellowship. The fellowship provides $30,000 support and will be awarded to an outstanding senior scholar from any discipline who will advance genocide research through the use of the USC Shoah Foundation Visual History Archive and other USC resources.

During the weekend of October 10-11, the University of Southern California gathered international academics, musicians and members of the Los Angeles community for a symposium and series of events, collectively called Singing in the Lion’s Mouth: Music as Resistance to Genocide. Hosted by Professor Wolf Gruner of the USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research, and Professor Nick Strimple of the USC Thornton School of Music, the symposium, film screening and concert were also sponsored by USC’s Vision and Voices arts and humanities initiative. The following paragraphs are a reflection on the individual events that made up the weekend, and an exploration into the larger ideas raised in discussions over the course of the weekend.

USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research welcomed the University of Munich’s Maximilian Strnad to USC last week.

Maximilian Strnad, a young German scholar who is currently a fellow at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum’s research center, gave a public lecture at the USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research focusing on the experiences of the last remaining Jews under the German Reich — intermarried Jews.

The USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research invites research proposals from advanced standing Ph.D. candidates for its 2016-2017 Margee and Douglas Greenberg Research Fellowship. The fellowship provides $4,000 support for dissertation research focused on testimony from the Visual History Archive.

The group aims to discover new insights about movement, spaces and time in Holocaust survivor testimonies.

The USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research invites research proposals from advanced standing Ph.D. candidates for its 2016-2017 Inaugural Robert J. Katz Research Fellowship in Genocide Studies. The fellowship provides $4,000 support for dissertation research focused on testimony from the Visual History Archive.

The USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research invites proposals for its 2016-2017 Rutman Fellowship for Research and Teaching that will provide summer support for one member of the University of Pennsylvania faculty to integrate testimonies from the USC Shoah Foundation Visual History Archive (VHA) into a new or existing course. .

The USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research invites proposals for its 2016-2017 A.I. and Manet Schepps Foundation Teaching Fellow Program that will provide support for one member of the Texas A&M University faculty to integrate testimonies from the USC Shoah Foundation Visual History Archive (VHA) into a new or existing course.

The USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research invites proposals for its 2016-2017 Teaching Fellowship that will provide support for university and college faculty to integrate testimonies from the USC Shoah Foundation Visual History Archive (VHA) into new or existing courses. This fellowship is only available to faculty at universities and colleges that subscribe to the VHA, either directly or through ProQuest.

The USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research invites research proposals from undergraduate USC students for its 2016 DEFY Summer Research Fellowships. The fellowships provide $1,000 support for undergraduate USC students doing research focused on the USC Shoah Foundation Visual History Archive and/or other unique USC resources and collections during the summer of 2016.

The USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research invites research proposals from USC faculty members and graduate students for its Summer 2016 Research Fellowships. The fellowships provide $3,000 support for USC faculty and USC graduate students doing research focused on the USC Shoah Foundation Visual History Archive and/or other unique USC resources and collections during the summer of 2016.

In early January, four members of the Holocaust Geographies Collaborative visited the USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research for a week of intensive discussion, research, experimentation, and collaboration.

The multidisciplinary Holocaust Geographies Collaborative research group returned to USC Shoah Foundation and shared their plans for an exciting new project harnessing the power of testimony that will begin this summer.

PhD candidates, undergraduates and college faculty have the opportunity to research the Visual History Archive in five fellowships currently accepting applications at USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research.

Kiril Feferman, 2015-16 Fellow at USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research, concluded his four-month fellowship with a lecture Feb. 2 at USC about stories of religiously motivated survival and rescue in the occupied Soviet territories during World War II.

Julia Werner, the 2015/2016 Margee and Douglas Greenberg Research Fellow, finished up her two-and-a-half week visit to USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research last Thursday with a talk, “Beyond the Pictorial Frame: Ghettoization of the Jews in Poland,” on her research.

Kiril Feferman, PhD, the 2015-2016 Center Fellow, gave a public lecture at the USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research focusing on the underresearched topic of the role of religion in influencing the behavior and decisions of Jews and non-Jews in the Nazi-occupied Soviet territories between 1941 and 1944.

Julia Werner, the 2015-2016 Greenberg Fellow, gave a public lecture at the USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research focusing on photographs of ghettoization of the Jewish population in Poland, which is part of her wider dissertation research project on photography in occupied Poland.

In her talk, Bothe shared her analysis of comments on USC Shoah Foundation's YouTube channel.

USC Shoah Foundation Center for Advanced Genocide Research is offering summer fellowships for undergraduate students, graduate students, and faculty at University of Southern California. The deadline to submit an application is March 31, 2016.