The Harris Center supports and presents various lectures, book talks, and other discussions on timely topics relating to Judaic Studies.
"Women in the Holocaust - Current Scholarship in the Field"
August 28, 2025
7:00 pm
Sarah Cushman is a historian and the Director of the Holocaust Educational Foundation at Northwester University. Her lecture is centered on studies of women’s experiences as perpetrators, victims, and bystanders during the Nazi era have proliferated over the past 40 years. Yet, this scholarship remains relatively unknown in the general public, and sometimes among scholars as well.
This lecture will provide an overview of the impact of Nazi policies on various groups of women in Nazi-occupied and -allied Europe, including women/girls with disabilities, Romani women, lesbians, and Jewish women. Regarding Jewish women, we will look at Jewish women’s lives in ghettos, in hiding, and in resistance groups. We will explore not only the historiography on the topic, but also some of the results and directions of current scholarship.