Friday, November 11, 2011

David Shneer, professor of history and director of Jewish Studies at the University of Colorado, Boulder, will give a multimedia presentation on his recently published project, "Through Soviet Jewish Eyes: Photography, War and the Holocaust," at 7 p.m., Sunday, Nov. 13, in room 1111 of Kenan Hall on the University of North Carolina Wilmington's campus.

Shneer's visit to campus is sponsored by UNCW's Department of History. Jarrod Tanny, UNCW Charles and Hannah Block Distinguished Professor in Jewish History, is chairing the event, which is free and open to the public.

Shneer will share his insight of an elite group of two dozen Soviet-Jewish photographers who took part in a social project that portrays an emotional and visual story of the "unprecedented horror we now call the Holocaust." Shneer provides the audience a rare opportunity to witness never-before-published photographs from families, collectors and private archives.

Shneer will give a different presentation, "Memorials to the Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals: Who and What Is Being Remembered?", at 4 p.m. Monday, Nov. 14 in the Wrightsville Beach Room of UNCW's Fisher Student Center. Through the power of photography, this presentation explores the persecution of gay men during the Holocaust.

This program is co-sponsored by UNCW's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Questioning, Intersex and Advocate Resource Center. It is free and open to students, faculty, staff and members of the community.

Tikkun magazine has called Shneer "taboo-breaking" and the Frankfurt General Newspaper called him "path breaking."

He has lived and worked as a scholar and writer in Russia, Germany and Israel and has written for the New York Times, Huffington Post, Rocky Mountain News and the Denver Post as well as magazines dedicated to Jewish life and culture, including Forward, Pakntreger, Jewcy and Nextbook.

Shneer has taught or been a scholar-in-residence at the University of California campuses at Berkeley and Davis, and at the University of Illinois, the National Yiddish Book Center, the University of Wisconsin, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, serving as the Pearl Resnick Fellow, and the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley. He serves as consultant to numerous Jewish agencies on questions of contemporary Jewish identity, and serves on the board of directors of the Association for Jewish Studies. He has won prestigious fellowships from the Social Science Research Council, Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, the International Research and Exchange Council and the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

There will be a book signing before and after each of the events. An assortment of Shneer's books will be available for purchase.

Media are encouraged to cover the presentation and book signings on Shneer's project on Sunday, Nov. 13 at 7 p.m. in Kenan Hall.

For more information on the presentations or Shneer, go to http://uncw.edu/hst/news.html

Media Contact:
Joy Davis, UNCW Marketing and Communications, 910.632.3903 or davisjc@uncw.edu