Graduate Certificate
in holocaust studies
The Graduate Certificate in Holocaust Studies offers an opportunity to explore one of the defining subjects of modern history and its enduring legacies through an interdisciplinary and globally informed perspective.
Program Overview
In this program, students will examine the history of the Holocaust alongside the study of antisemitism, Nazi Germany, its allies, and occupied European countries. Courses will cover Jewish life, communal and individual responses to persecution and genocide, and displacement and migration. Attention will be given to memory and commemoration and to the Holocaust’s enduring impact on contemporary societies in Europe, the Americas, and the Middle East.
Students will work with diverse primary sources and the latest scholarship and develop the skills to analyze complex historical questions, critically evaluate competing interpretations, and communicate their findings to academic and public audiences.
Bringing together the expertise of scholars in history, Jewish studies, literature, political science, religious studies, anthropology, and related fields, the certificate prepares students to bring historically grounded perspectives on the Holocaust and its legacies to teaching, research, museums, archives, public history, and other professional settings.
The certificate requires successful completion of 9 credits. For a list of courses available each semester, click HERE.
Scholarships
Tuition, research and travel scholarships are available for eligible admitted students.
How to Apply
Click the link above and follow the instructions on the page to complete and submit a Graduate School application along with any required documentation.
2. Applicants should upload the following materials with their application:
- Letter of motivation
- CV
- Transcripts
- 2-3 letters of recommendation
- Writing sample
Our Graduate Coordinator is available to answer questions and help guide you through the program application.
Advising
Available Courses – Spring 2027
Aftermath of the Holocaust | JST 6705 (27530)
T 3:00 PM – 4:55 PM (Periods 8-9) and R 4:05 PM – 4:55 PM (Period 9)
Instructor: Natalia Aleksiun | Syllabus coming soon
What did it mean to rebuild a life after the Holocaust? This course examines the experiences of Jewish survivors in postwar Europe as they sought to recover their identities, rebuild families and communities, and create new lives in the aftermath of the Holocaust. It explores their social, legal, economic, religious, and cultural worlds in their countries of origin and in Displaced Persons (DP) camps. The course considers what survivors viewed as essential to regaining a sense of normalcy, the roles of homes, institutions, and rituals in rebuilding their lives, and the ways in which the Holocaust reshaped their choices about where and how to live. Through these questions, the course explores the challenges and possibilities of rebuilding Jewish lives after genocide in postwar Europe and beyond.
Israel in French Cinema | JST 6705 (27613)
MWF 12:50 PM – 1:40 PM (Period 6)
Instructor: Gayle Zachmann | Syllabus coming soon
Moshé Mizrahi was the first Israeli director to win an Oscar. He did it in 1978 with a French film, Madame Rosa. It was one of three films he made in France. Six years earlier Claude Lanzmann’s 1972 documentary opus Pourquoi Israel (Israel, Why) moved from evocations of the Shoah onto a panorama of the fledgling Jewish state. The two films point to already ongoing exchange between Israeli and French cinemas, cinematic cultures, and culture makers.
This seminar-style course explores Franco-Israeli cultural relations and the evolving representations of Israel in French and francophone cinema(s). In the decades following the Holocaust and Israeli independence, along with memory of the Shoah, the cinematic figuration of Israel and its geopolitical and cultural relations with France underwent profound transformations. Organized thematically, the class historically contextualizes and analyzes French and Israeli films and co-productions. Students engage with films, targeted readings, and interviews with filmmakers, critics, archivists to understand the shifting aesthetic, social, political and commercial contexts with which the films engage.
Weekly module themes include : Israel and French Cinemas; National and Minor Cinemas; The Politics and Poetics of Loss and Memory; Visions of Israel; In the Shadow of France; Migrations and Memory; Exiles and Diasporas; Kibbutz Dreams; From the Shoah to Terror; Conflict in the 21st Century; Mossad Spies and their Others; Franco-Judaisms and Universalisms; Trials, Testimony, and the Nation(s).
Latin America, WWII, and the Holocaust | JST 6705 (27531)
T 10:40 AM – 11:30 AM (Period 4) and R 10:40 AM – 12:35 PM (Periods 4-5)
Instructor: Raanan Rein | Syllabus coming soon
This course examines the role of Latin American countries during World War II, from Argentina’s neutrality to Brazil’s participation in the war. Through readings, primary sources, and films, we will explore Jewish immigration to Latin America during the years of the Third Reich, the German communities in the region, and the arrival of both Holocaust survivors and Nazi perpetrators after 1945. We will also examine memorials to the Shoah and Holocaust museums across Latin America, considering how the Holocaust has been remembered and represented in the region.