Museums have long been at the forefront of public engagement with the history and memory of the Holocaust. But as the possibilities of technology for discovery and learning about such an emotionally fraught subject expand, and the question of what the Holocaust has to teach us remains as thorny as ever, at museums old and new the goals of that public engagement are undergoing serious revision.

Yasmine Lucas, an anthropologist at the University of Toronto, has written widely on the ways in which Holocaust museums in North America—their curators, advisors, funders, and visitors—are navigating this moment. She takes a particular interest in the Montreal Holocaust Museum, which is preparing to open a more modern and interactive exhibit inside a new building in 2027. Lucas joins the podcast to discuss the role of the twenty-first-century Holocaust museum, how curatorial decisions respond to the reality of a dwindling survivor population, and the changing needs and demands of visitors in a climate of political and social divisiveness.

For more, check out Lucas’s recent essay, “Dimensions in Testimony: On Revamping Holocaust Museums,” published in the spring 2025 volume of Canadian Jewish Studies / Études juives canadiennes. And “Holocaust Sublime: The Naturalization of a Feeling,” also from 2025, in Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies.

Also, don’t miss “Studies Show,” a new collaboration between CJS / Éjc and Scribe Quarterly, the magazine of The Canadian Jewish News, designed to introduce academic research about Canadian Jewry to a wider readership!

This episode was produced and edited by Theadora Draper. Original music is by J. K. Bradley. Our executive producers are Joshua Tapper and David Koffman.

Please visit the website of the Association for Canadian Jewish Studies to learn more about its work, how it supports the research and study of Canadian Jewish life, and how you can contribute. The Association for Canadian Jewish Studies is based at the Israel and Golda Koschitzky Centre for Jewish Studies at York University, in Toronto, ON.

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